VANCOUVER ISLAND and BRITISH COLUMBIA 



LONDON 
PRINTED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO. 
NEW-STREET SQUARE 



FACTS AND FIGUEES 



RELATING TO 



VANCOUVER ISLAND and BRITISH COLUMBIA 



WHAT TO EXPECT and HOW TO GET THESE 



WITH ILLUSTRATIVE MAPS 



BY 



J. DESPAED PEMBEETON 

SURVEYOR -GENERAL V. I. 



" If, as I firmly believe, it is our duty to maintain our great and valuable Colonial 
empire, let us see that those principles are sound which we adopt in our Colonial 
administration " ■ Lobd John Russell 

" I believe that much of the power and influence of this country depends upon its having 

large Colonial possessions in different parts of the world that by the acquisition of its 

Colonial dominions the nation has incurred a responsibility of the highest kind, which it is 
not at liberty to throw off" Earl Geet 




LONDON 
LONGMAN, GREEN, LONGMAN, AND ROBERTS 

1860 






TO 



/r° 



JOHN RAE, ESQ. M.D. RR.G.S. 

CORRESPONDING MEMBER OF THE GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY OP NEW YORK, 
ETC ETC. 



My dear Dr. Rae, 

I would ask you, in glancing over the following pages, which 
I o myself the honour of Dedicating to' you, to bear in mind, that, 
as the circumstances of the Colonies to whicji they relate will neces- 
sarily vary with every fresh discovery and political change from year to 
year, and even from month to month, a studied composition would have 
been but labour lost. 

From abundant material I have endeavoured to select facts suffi- 
cient to support the opinions expressed, the whole being so roughly 
put together as to constitute a mere temporary literary structure, 
which I hope at leisure hours in the Colonies to rebuild and reproduce 
in a more complete and perfeet form. 

I take the liberty of associating your name with the volume, not 
simply on account of private friendship or personal admiration, nor 
because you are familiar with and take a deep interest in the subject 
of it; but influenced in doing so by this additional motive: Arctic 
enterprise, in which you have taken so distinguished a part, may 
be said to be practically at an end ; the idea revives painful recol- 
lections only,— of cold unendurable, ships abandoned, famine, and the 
tomb ; and I had hopes of enlisting those energies, deprived of their 
object, but still unimpaired notwithstanding the hardships you have 



VI DEDICATION. 

undergone, in an enterprise of great national importance, — that of 
connecting England, via the Canadas, Red River Colony, Sascatchewan, 
British Columbia, and Vancouver Island, with Australia, by one un- 
broken chain of commercial and postal communication. 

That the undertaking, large as it may sound, is far from being 
impracticable, will, I am persuaded, be inferred from the evidence 
adduced. 

But it is to individual exertion and private enterprise that we must 
look for the realisation of the project, towards the accomplishment of 
which it seems certain that the interests of various classes of the com- 
munity and the assistance of Governments will not be invoked in vain. 

I rejnain, my dear Dr. Rae, 

Very sincerely yours, 

J. DESPARD PEMBERTCXN". 



Parsonage Housii:, Kensall Green, 
London : August 20, I860. 



CONTENTS, 



CHAPTER I. 
Preliminary Remarks .... Page 1 

CHAP. II. 

General Appearance of the Country. — Salt Water and Fresh Water 
Navigation. — Land: Proportion of Open Land and Waste. — ■ 

Flora. Fertility. — Profits of Cultivation. — Stock. — Timber. — - 

Fisheries. — Game. — Mode and Terms of Sale of Lands . 8 

CHAP. III. 

Minerals and Rocks. — Gold in British Columbia, Vancouver Island, 
and Queen Charlotte's Island. — Coal on the Pacific, Iron, Copper, 
and Plumbago. — Limestone, Sandstone, and Marble. — Various 
coloured Earths. — Salt Springs . . . .36 

CHAP. IV. 

Chief Towns of Vancouver Island and British Columbia . 49 

CHAP. V, 

Institution of the Colonies of Vancouver Island and British Colum- 
bia — Their Progress traced, and compared with that of the 
adjoining American States — Their Commerce. ■ — Policy of 
England and America respectively, with regard to their Posses- 
sions on the Pacific . . . . .57 



Vlll CONTENTS. 



CHAP. VI. 



Koutes to the Pacific — By Long Sea — By Royal Mail Line, or 
vid New York, across the Isthmus to San Francisco, and thence 
to the British Colonies. — The four Overland American Routes. 
— Postal ...... Page 84 

CHAP. VII. 

Proposed British Emigrant and Postal Route to the Pacific, from 
Canada, south of the Lakes, through Red River and British 
Columbia to Vancouver Island. — Climate of the proposed Route. 
■ — Trade with China and Japan. — Postal Communication with 
Australia. — Conclusions arrived at . . .97 

CHAP. VIII. 

Society in the Colonies . . . . .127 

CHAP. IX. 

A few Suggestions to different Classes of intending Emigrants 135 



APPENDIX. 

Journal of a Tour across Vancouver Island, from Nimkish River to 
Nootka Sound, by Hamilton Moffat, Esq., in the H. B. Co.'s Ser- 
vice . . . . ... . 143 

Report of an Excursion from Nanaimo vid Quallehum, Lake Horn, 
and Alberni Canal to the Pacific, by J. D. Pemberton . 147 

Report of an Excursion from Cowichan Harbour to Nitinat, by 
J. D. Pemberton . . . . . .149 

Extract from Journal of Captain Vancouver on the Country in the 
Neighbourhood of Point Breakers . . . .150 

Report of Major William Downie of a Tour from Port Essington to 
the Babine Lakes and Interior of British Columbia . 151 

The Months most favourable for doubling Cape Horn from either 
Ocean . . ' . . • . .154 

Professor A. S. Taylor, M.D. F.R.S., on the Salt Springs of Van- 
couver Island . . . • • .159 



CONTENTS. IX 

Professor James Tennant on the Rocks of Vancouver Island, Page 160 

Naval Station of the Pacific Squadron {Times' Correspondent, June 

26,1860.). • • • • • • 161 

Horse Racing in California . . • • .162 

Law of Land Sales . . . • • .163 

Laws relating to Purchase of Lands by Aliens . .167 

Regulations for the working of Gold Mines in British Columbia 168 
The Chinese . . . . . . * . 170 



MAPS. 

I. Map of British Columbia and Queen Charlotte's Island 

to face title-page. 
II. Map of Vancouver Island, and Diagram of Esquimalt and Vic- 
toria Harbours .... Page 56 

III. Map of the principal American Overland Routes to the 

Pacific . . . . . .97 

IV. Map of proposed British Emigrant and Postal Route from 

Canada, through Red River Settlement, to the North Pacific 
Colonies . . . . .127 



FACTS AND FIGURES 



RELATING TO 



VANCOUVER ISLAND & BRITISH COLUMBIA. 



CHAPTEE I. 



PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 



I feel satisfied that neither preface nor apology are 
required to awaken or revive the interest felt in England 
on the subject to which the following pages relate ; but 
I think it due to the reader, before he shall have taken 
the trouble to read them, to say something of my object 
in publishing, the nature of the statements contained, 
and the authority on which they rest. 

In my official capacity, I continue to receive verbal 
and written communications from a great number of 
persons resident in Great Britain or the Canadas, who, 
as intending emigrants, merchants, or capitalists, require 
some detailed information about the British colonies on 
the N. W. Pacific. To reply to these inquiries sepa- 
rately, and at the same time satisfactorily, is impossible, 
nor can I refer the querists to any existing publication 
containing useful, or even reliable, information. 

To compensate for their scanty information on points 

// B 



2 EARLY SETTLEMENT OF THE NORTH-WEST COAST. 

of practical utility, such publications usually treat at 
length of the discovery of America, generally by the 
agency of Christopher Columbus, but some, by that of 
John Cabot : they discuss the questions, whether Juan 
de Fuca was a myth or a man, and if the latter, who 
first verified the discovery of the strait named after him ; 
whether this strait was the Strait of Anian, or if the 
latter connected Hudson's Bay with the Atlantic; — 
whether Perez or Cook first sighted JSTootka ; of the 
Spanish mine secretly worked at Hogg Island ; the mys- 
terious cairns of the north-west, and remains of a 
chimney at Neah Bay. All which questions I shall 
assume the reader to have already resolved to his own 
satisfaction ; being more interesting to the historian or 
antiquarian, than to the practical inquirer of the pre- 
sent day, for whose perusal these pages are intended. 

No doubt, the story of the early settlement of the 
north-west coast of America, with its thrilling ad- 
ventures by sea and land, its brilliant discoveries and 
appalling disasters, its anecdotes of crafty Spaniards and 
unsuspecting natives, hardy trappers and reckless buc- 
caneers, could not fail, if well told, to interest the 
public, and repay the publisher. This department I 
leave intact, intending in these pages not to trespass 
upon antiquity more than I can avoid, nor to revive, 
unless it be incidentally and where the interest is of the 
present time, even the more recent memories of the 
sagacious Mears, or the indefatigable Vancouver. The 
names of the early pioneers will always be heard with 
reverence, although wiser in their own generation than 
in ours, which is an age of steam and telegraph, of 
marvellous invention and rapid discovery. Humboldt 
himself, were he to live over again, would find it 
difficult to achieve an equal reputation by depicting 



OBJECT OF PUBLICATION. 3 

a continent, the privacy of which is invaded by our 
noblesse in quest of buffalo and bear tracks, where 
botanists search for seeds, and labourers for gold, where 
merchants travel, and where artists sketch. 

It is my intention to use freely the published evidence 
of any modern witness, where such evidence is prefer- 
able to my own; so that this may, to some extent, be 
regarded rather as a compilation of facts than as an 
original treatise, in which the writer can have no other 
object than to supply correct information. An influx of 
strangers adds considerably to the work of the office 
under my direction ; and, in addition to this consider- 
ation, I should feel much regret if, by any too highly- 
coloured or over-sanguine statements of mine, people 
were induced to undertake an unprofitable voyage. 

But I had another motive in this publication — viz. 
that the books alluded to, in addition to containing a 
great amount of useless matter, not unfrequently propa- 
gate very erroneous statements with regard to these 
colonies. To correct these errors seriatim would be 
too tedious, and would in fact amount to writing the 
books over again ; but I shall select, by way of example, 
a description of Vancouver Island by Colonel Walter 
Colquhoun Grant, read at the Geographical Society, and 
published by Mr. Eoutledge, bound up with some other 
material and a few of the admirable letters of the 
" Times' " Correspondent. The colonel had of course 
no intention to convey an erroneous impression of the 
island, but fell into a very common mistake, that of ap- 
plying to the whole island, which he did not explore 
or examine, a description which ought only to have 
been applied to a very small fraction of the island 
with which he was familiar. It does not answer to 
form opinions of any country on the expede Herculem 

B 2 



4 THE C0UKTRY MISREPRESENTED. 

principle, and comments are futile where the ground 
has not been trod. 

The colonel appears to have formed his opinion on a 
single excursion up the Sooke Kiver. That every part 
of the ground he examined is quite as iniquitous as 
he describes the whole island to be, I can vouch. But 
within two miles of that river some very beautiful 
country has been since discovered by the Messrs. Muir. 
The publication says, " It is difficult to convey upon 
paper a correct impression of the interior, the sight of 
which, seen from the first eminence that he ascends, 
causes to the explorer a hopeless elongation of visage." 
No single view should have been so discouraging as 
this : had the explorer ascended a second hill, or per- 
haps a third, so agreeable might have been the prospect, 
as to have caused his countenance with pleasure to 
expand in the opposite direction. But it may be asked, 
how is it that some others who have seen the island 
have carried away a similar unfavourable impression? 
The answer is obvious, they have seen the island, but 
not explored it ; they have seen from a distance the 
elevated rocks and hills, but have not wandered through 
the open lawns and rich valleys, which appear, in number 
and extent, to increase with every fresh addition to 
our knowledge of the country. To illustrate this in a 
familiar way : if dinner were on the table, and the ar- 
rangement looked at from a point on a level with the 
table-cloth, the mind would receive an impression of 
legs of mutton and coverdishes only, and the intervals 
of flowered damask would be unseen and unrecorded. 

The same book abounds with absurdities like the fol- 
lowing : " Between Fort Hope and Fort Yale, sixteen 
miles, the view presents no difficulties whatever to a 
canoe ascending — except in one place, where there is a 



FOREIGN RELATIONS. 5 

rapid, which, however, is no great obstacle, as, close to 
the shore, in the eddy, a canoe is easily towed past it ; " 
the fact being that the steamer " Umatilla " has plied 
between the points mentioned. And again, of certain 
Indians, "they all prefer their meat putrid, and fre- 
quently keep it until it smells so strong as to be disgust- 
ing. Part of the salmon they bury underground for 
two or three months to putrefy, and the more it is 
decayed, the greater delicacy they consider it." 

I read this passage to the infinite amusement of a 
gentleman well acquainted with the part of the country 
to which it relates, and who had six times crossed the 
Eocky Mountains, without as much as hearing of any- 
thing of the sort.* 

It is impossible to do justice to this subject, without 
considering with it the nature and extent of our rela- 
tions, commercial or otherwise, with the Foreign States 
adjacent. San Francisco is at present the great centre 
of commerce, and holds as it were the keys of the 
Pacific ; despatching annually her mercantile fleet of 
2000 sail, and 600,000 tons, to almost every port of 
importance in the world. Our principal trade is with 
her : Washington and Oregon supply our miners with 
beef and flour ; Victoria is built principally with timber 
from Puget Sound ; any spars of consequence that 
have as yet been shipped by English merchants were 
hewn in Admiralty Inlet ; and the only communica- 
tions, postal or otherwise, to the country are by 
American roads or in American steamers. And if it 
can be at the same time shown, as I think it can, that 
our natural advantages are in many respects, in point 
of situation and products, superior to those of California, 

* Dugald M'Tavish, Esq, 
b 3 



6 KESPONSIBILITY. 

this consideration may tend to increased exertion, and 
may prompt us to enter into friendly and not unsuc- 
cessful competition, to share the commerce which San 
Francisco now monopolises. 

Although, as I before mentioned, in point of facts 
produced, these pages may, in part, be regarded as a 
compilation, instances will occur in which I shall have 
occasion to express unreservedly my own opinions ; 
and as I write, not in an official capacity, but as a pri- 
vate individual, and in doing so violate no confidence, 
nor use any information to which the public could not 
have had access equally with myself, such opinions, 
if inconclusive or even injudicious, cannot do harm, 
since this hypothesis would deprive them of force, and 
since they are at best but the opinions of a unit of the 
community addressed to the mass. 

The substance of some short despatches of my own, 
written to the secretary of the Hudson's Bay Company, 
I readily obtained permission from Mr. Thomas Fraser, 
the present secretary, to print; extracts from them 
appear in the Appendix, 

In venturing to impugn the policy adopted towards 
these colonies at their foundation, years ago, now 
generally accepted and become almost hereditary, I 
disclaim any allusion to the talented gentlemen who 
preside over the Colonial Department, nor have I the 
least ambition to identify myself with a class which 
exists, I presume, in most colonies, who hold that 
rulers at a distance are necessarily imperfectly informed. 
On the contrary, I would be ungrateful as well as 
culpable, if I did not acknowledge the kind interest, as 
well as the intimate knowledge of circumstances and 
places in these colonies, manifested by all the gentlemen 
of the Colonial Department with whom I have had the 



PUBLICATION NOT ILL-TIMED. 7 

honour to converse. In one respect especially they 
stand on vantage ground : disinterested and aloof from 
petty animosities and party politics, their decisions are 
arrived at with a judgment unbiassed, and with con- 
scientious impartiality. 

Nor can it be said that these remarks are inoppor- 
tune at a time when England, councilled by statesmen 
of unsurpassed ability, cannot but regard with concern 
the continued exodus of almost the whole natural 
increase of Ireland * (some 70,000 or 80,000 a year) to 
people, not her own colonies, but to swell the millions 
of the states adjacent, because they hold out to the 
emigrant facilities so obvious and inducements so in- 
viting, as, in the opinion of these, to neutralize the 
benefit of living under the flag of Great Britain ; when 
the necessity for quicker communication with Australia 
and China is every day more apparent ; and, when 
want of population has more than once led the country 
to the verge of war, and plainly shown that in launch- 
ing this new colonial adventure upon the waters of 
civilisation, measures should have been at the same 
time taken to man the vessel with a British crew. 

In conclusion, I would merely observe, that the 
same reason that induces me to publish, — the scantiness 
of our information on the colonies in question, — compels 
me to make the publication short. No advantage can 
be gained by diluting the little reliable information we 
possess. 

* Vide " Times' " leading article, May 3, 1860. 



b 4 



CHAR IX 

GENERAL APPEARANCE OF THE COUNTRY. — SALT WATER AND FRESH 

WATER NAVIGATION. PROPORTION OF OPEN AND WASTE LAND. 

FLORA. FERTILITY. PROFITS OF CULTIVATION. STOCK. — TIMBER. 

FISHERIES. GAME. MODE AND TERMS OF SALE OF LANDS. 

General Appearance. 

Steaming for the first time eastward into the Straits of 
Juan de Fuca, the scene which presents itself to a 
stranger is exceedingly novel and interesting. On his 
right hand is Washington Territory, with its snowy 
mountain range stretching parallel to his course for 
sixty miles, flanked with Mount Eanier and culminat- 
ing in the centre with Mount Olympus. Of these 
mountains the base is in some places at the coast, in 
others many miles from it. This range is occasionally 
intersected with deep and gloomy valleys, of which the 
Valley of Angels is the gloomiest and most remarkable ; 
and every succession of cloud and sunshine changes 
the panorama. On his left is Vancouver Island, in 
contrast looking low, although even there as late as 
June some specks of snow may be detected on distant 
mountain tops. Straight before him is the Gulf of 
Georgia, studded with innumerable islands, which, to 
be seen to advantage, should be viewed toward even- 
ing, when, as is often the case, the sun is reflected 
from waters as smooth as those of an inland lake. In 
the background is British Columbia, and furthest of all 
the Cascade Kange, and glittering peaks of Mount 



HARBOURS OF THE PACIFIC. 9 

Baker. At first sight the whole country appears to be 
clothed with forest, for it is not until we travel inland 
that we ascertain that in the lowlands the pines take 
frequently the form of belts, enclosing rich valleys and 
open prairies, lawns in which oaks and maples, not 
pines, predominate ; marshes covered with long coarse 
grass, and lakes fringed with flowering shrubs, willows, 
and poplars. Nor is the scene in the strait wanting 
in animation : vessels trading with the sound, steamers, 
canoes filled with painted Indians, enliven the picture, 
to say nothing of vast numbers of waterfowl, which 
awaken the echoes on every side. 

Navigation. 

It appears far from improbable that this strait will 
ultimately become the great commercial thoroughfare 
for the commerce of the North Pacific, and that Juan 
de Fuca, when he discovered it 260 years ago, was 
right in his conjecture that he had found the north- 
west passage. This idea is strengthened by an exami- 
nation of the ports which lay between San Francisco 
and the strait. That this coast line, nearly 600 miles 
in length, should not possess a single respectable har- 
bour is a very remarkable fact. Of these harbours so 
called a sample or two will suffice. Eetracing our 
steps, Humbolt is the first harbour of importance north 
of San Francisco : so still the water, it looks like an 
inland lake, with a country in the back ground of 
exceeding beauty ; but the entrance is guarded by a 
heavy swell extending for miles along the shore, and 
by foam and breakers reaching far to the west. I first 
visited it in 1851 in the steamer " Sea-Gull; " the steamer 
" Preble " was a short distance in advance. The passen- 
gers, from a dislike to salt water, or to avoid risk of 



10 HARBOURS OF THE PACIFIC. 

being washed over, had gone below : the moment was a 
trying one, as an accident to the machinery must have 
proved fatal. Such an accident did occur to the 
" Preble;" she struck, became a wreck, and in what ap- 
peared but an instant, the waves seemed to overwhelm 
her and the spray to rise high above the funnel. I was 
there again in 1859, and from the elevated roof of a 
saw mill, in company with several other persons, wit- 
nessed a very impressive scene. A vessel had got 
entangled among the breakers, the crew had made 
every effort to wear her off the threatening shore, and 
stand out to sea, but the wind was insufficient. Her 
destruction seemed but a matter of moments ; a gal- 
lant little steam tug, which had gone to the rescue, 
was every now and again lost to sight among the 
breakers. At length success was achieved, and amid 
cheers, which distance and the roar of waters pre- 
vented from being heard, the vessel was towed out of 
danger. 

The entrance to the Columbia Eiver is not a whit 
better ; it is the terror of navigators. I crossed it but 
once, and then between walls of breakers ; the rudder 
was disabled and the vessel cast away on a sand bank, 
luckily within the entrance, where she remained three 
days waiting for assistance. That the early navigators 
should have failed to discover rivers, however large, 
but with bars at the entrance such as this and the 
Fraser have, is not at all to be wondered at. 

Of the other harbours within the 600 miles stretch 
of coast which I have not noticed, the traveller cannot 
fail to remark the absence of shipping in them. Ves- 
sels cannot remain long in roadsteads so exposed, liable 
as they are to be blown ashore by a westerly wind at 
any time springing up. 



STEAIT OP JUAN DE FITCA. 11 

As to the commerce of the beautiful valleys of the 
Columbia and Willamette Eivers, it seems certain that 
an outlet for it will be found, by railway or otherwise, 
through the valley of the Cowlitz Eiver, into Ad- 
miralty Inlet and thence by the straits into the 
Pacific. 

In the few remarks that follow on the navigation 
and harbour facilities at and north of the strait, I shall 
avoid minute details, which those interested can find in 
the admirable charts and sailing directions of Captain 
George Henry Richards, and those of Captain Alden of 
the U. S. Coast Survey. 

The Strait of Juan de Fuca is, on an average, eleven 
miles wide, and is free from sunken rocks or shoals ; 
its direction is east and west for about seventy miles 
to its junction with the channels, which lead by a 
northerly course into the Gulf of Georgia, which sepa- 
rates Vancouver Island from the continent. The ap- 
proach is safe for all descriptions of vessels, being liable 
to no other dangers than those incident to gales from 
the south-east, which, with considerable intervals of 
tranquil weather, are, in winter, not uncommon, and to 
fogs, or rather dense smoke arising from forests on fire 
in autumn. Although in the latter case soundings are 
a safeguard, and good anchorage can generally be 
found within a mile of either shore. 

The facility of entering and navigating this strait 
has been greatly increased by the erection of light- 
houses on the south shore by the United States Go- 
vernment, and on the north by the British. That at 
Cape Flattery stands 162 ft. above the sea, and in 
clear weather the light can be seen distinctly 20 miles 
off. New Dungeness is 100 ft. high, and has a fog-bell 
attached to the lighthouse. Besides these there are 



12 ESQUIMALT AND VICTOKIA. 

lighthouses on Smith's Island, at Esquimalt Harbour, 
and Eace Eock ; the last, however, is not yet lighted. 

Once within the strait, on both coasts safe anchorage 
and good harbours are everywhere met with. On the 
north shore, thirteen miles east of Point •Bonilla, is 
Port San Juan, — a spacious bay well sheltered from 
every winter wind. Thirty miles further inland, as it 
were, is Sooke Basin : perfectly land-locked, and large 
enough to hold a fleet, with the disadvantage that it is 
entered by a narrow and rather intricate channel. 
Four miles farther is Beech er Bay, and then come the 
harbours of Esquimalt and Victoria. That harbours 
such as these two last named should occur at the 
limit of sailing navigation is a very happy circumstance 
for these colonies. The waters of the Gulf of Georgia 
are well adapted for steamers, but, there, uncertain tides, 
and variable winds, fogs, currents, hidden dangers and 
detention, practically exclude sailing vessels. 

Esquimalt Harbour has, we are told,* been selected 
by Government as the naval depot of the Pacific : if 
true, a better selection could not have been made ; for, 
though not first class in point of size, it is capable of 
holding at least a dozen ships of the fine, with any 
number of smaller vessels, while, if additional accom- 
modation were required, the inner basin at Sooke, not 
far off, could readily be converted into a second 
Hamoaze. In point of shelter, holding ground, facility 
of ingress and egress, dock sites and warfage, Esquimalt 
Harbour is without a rival, and appears to be the 
natural port of entry for sailing ships which have made 
a long sea-yoyage to either colony, and to be the 
proper starting-point for a fine of steamers connecting 
with British Columbia. 

* "Times," March 15. 1««n 



THE GULF OF GEORGIA. 13 

Victoria Harbour is three miles from Esquimalt, and 
although it cannot compete with the latter as a naval 
depot or as a port for clippers, it is far from unim- 
portant. Ordinary merchant vessels, by attending to 
the tides, can readily enter, and, once within, there is 
ample space and depth. The main objections to it are 
that the entrance is rather difficult at night to find, 
which could be remedied by a light, and a narrow sand 
bar, which could be removed at small expense. 

That these harbours are connected with upwards of 
100,000 acres of arable land in the background is a 
strong recommendation to them. 

To resume this question of navigation, I may men- 
tion that one peculiar advantage of the strait, as a 
refuge for sailing vessels, may be gathered from this 
consideration — -that, if a ship, running from a storm in 
the Pacific, having entered the strait, should be baffled 
in her endeavours to reach the harbour or anchorages 
just described on the north shore, the winds preventing 
must be fair to take her into Keah Bay, Calum Bay, 
Port Angelos, or Port Townsend, on the south shore. 

Next, taking a northerly course, we enter the Gulf 
of Georgia, having the contested group of Islands either 
on our right hand or on our left. Apart from questions 
of batteries and Whitworth guns, these islands are of 
no great value. They possess neither harbours nor 
town sites of consequence : the quantity of available 
land they contain is infinitesimal compared with that 
of either nation, adjacent and unoccupied. Destitute 
of fresh water streams, the fisheries in the neighbour- 
hood are not remarkable ; and since, if either nation 
possess these islands, they must, from their peculiar 
half-way position, become a thorn in the side of 
the American 24 per cent, tariff, it must appear to 



14 NANAIMO. 

persons who are not diplomatists astonishing that both 
nations did not at once decide the question by convert- 
ing them into an Indian reserve, for which they are 
peculiarly adapted. 

Having passed by this group of islands, Fraser Eiver 
lies on our right hand, and Nanaimo opposite to it on 
the left; before us is Johnston's Strait, the narrows 
where tides adjust their different levels in very violent 
manner, and a meeting of waters occurs very different 
from that which Moore has so beautifully described. 

The town of JSTanaimo, comprising as it does some 
fifty or sixty buildings, steam-engines, tramways, and 
piers, is very picturesquely situated on the north shore 
of an excellent harbour, backed by a range of hills 
some 3000 ft. high. . The river is very pretty in some 
places, particularly where tall maples overshadow it. 
In the harbour and rivers salmon abound, and excellent 
spars are found in the immediate neighbourhood. So 
great are the facilities for shipping coal, that, at any 
time of the year, 1000 tons a week can be removed 
without inconvenience. 

The foregoing is interesting, since, as recently as 
August 25th, 1858, the Lords Commissioners of Her 
Majesty's Treasury laid particular stress upon the want 
of harbour accommodation, and of development of the 
coal fields of Vancouver Island ; which, in the com- 
munication referred to, are assigned as their reasons for 
postponing the consideration of postal communication 
between Great Britain and these colonies. 

If I were to continue to enumerate and describe the 
harbours and inlets on the western coasts of the con- 
tinent and the island, and those of Queen Charlotte's 
Island, at least half a dozen, this small publication 
would, I fear, read like the commencement of a geo- 



FRASER RIVER. 15 

graphical dictionary. Enough, has perhaps been said to 
show that the facilities for navigation in the vicinity of 
these colonies is unrivalled, and that there is no want 
of harbour accommodation. 

Some, however, of the most important of the har- 
bours omitted in the foregoing I shall have occasion 
to touch upon farther on incidentally. 

Of those deep salt water inlets, with which the coast 
abounds, I may here mention two peculiarities. At 
the head of every one of those that I have ever visited 
a fresh- water stream is found. The second peculiarity 
is the frequency in them of gorges or contractions, 
through which, as the tide rises or falls, the water rushes 
with great violence. Some of these will, I have no 
doubt, be found valuable as water powers, although at 
present, skilled labour is too dear to make them so, and 
capital better expended on a steam engine. Which- 
ever way the tide might rush, a turbine fixed in one of 
these gorges would work uniformly. 

Having water communication still in view, and re- 
collecting that British Columbia is heavily timbered, 
and no direct main roads are as yet hewn through the 
forest into the interior, on looking at the map we are 
struck by the fact that the Eraser Eiver and the Colum- 
bia are the only avenues through which the country 
can be penetrated, if we except the natural passes in 
the Eocky Mountains. 

Traversing the country diagonally from corner to 
corner, 1000 miles in length, in volume and velocity, 
Fraser Eiver fully equals the Columbia, which it also 
resembles in the sand bar, occupying an area of fifty 
square miles at the entrance ; less dangerous only 
because the long swell of the Pacific is interrupted by 
the chain of islands intercepting it. As it is, sailing 



16 HARRISON AND LILOOETTE RIVERS. 

vessels constantly miss the channel and ground on it : 
if at high water, they are lightened to get them off; if at 
low water, the rising tide sets them free. On account 
of the softness of the bottom, injury in such cases is 
seldom sustained. 

For nearly a hundred miles from its entrance, as far 
at least as Hope, Fraser is navigable for steamers. In 
the middle of summer, when swollen by the melting 
snows of the Eocky Mountains, in which it rises, the 
water is highest, and the current, often six knots an 
hour, swiftest. 

Twelve miles farther, at Yale, the rapids commence, 
and from that point to its junction with Thomson's 
Eiver, some fifty-five miles, Fraser Eiver presents a 
spectacle of exceeding grandeur, more interesting, how- 
ever, to the artist than the navigator. Here, avoided by 
trails often thousands of feet above its level, white with 
foam, and impatient of confinement, the river is seen 
bursting through the walls of the mountain passes. 

It was in order to avoid this portion of the river 
that the Harrison Eiver and Lilooette route, 108 miles 
in length, was adopted, by which the traveller can reach 
a point north of the confluence of the Fraser and 
Thomson Eivers, by a succession of rivers, lakes, and 
trails, which, though rather circuitous, do not present 
difficulties so great as the portion of the Fraser de- 
scribed, the head of Harrison lake being the limit of 
steam navigation. 

Entering the country by the Columbia, steamers 
take the traveller as far as the Cascades or Dalls, and 
thence, by the continuous valleys of the Okanagan and 
Similkameen Eivers, the valley of the Thomson is 
reached. 

The interior of British Columbia is everywhere in- 



LAND. 17 

tersected by natural water communications, in which 
respect it greatly resembles the Canadas. 

Having thus taken an imperfect survey of the waters 
in the vicinity of the colonies, let us next take a glance 
at the land. 

Land. 

In area British Columbia, as the boundaries are at 
present arranged *, is about three and a half times as 
large as Great Britain, and Vancouver Island about 
half the size of Ireland. With a coast-line of 500 
miles, and 400 miles in width, varying in elevation 
from nothing to 16,000 feet above the sea, and com- 
posed, as this country is, of lake and mountain, forest, 
marsh and prairie, frequently alternating ; in these 
colonies, as might be expected, the greatest diversity 
of soil and clhnate is met with. As the latter has 
been justly termed the decisive condition on which the 
future of a country must mainly depend, I shall have 
occasion to discuss it pretty fully in another place ; it 
may therefore be sufficient here to say, that in the 
southern portion of Vancouver Island, and in parts of 
valleys of the Frazer, Lillooette, Columbia, and Thom- 
son Eivers, a clhnate quite as mild as that of Devonshire 
is indicated by birds of bright plumage, humming 
birds, cactuses growing in the open air, &c. While 
lands farther north, or in the neighbourhood of lofty 
mountain ranges, reproduce not unfrequently the 
climates of Hudson's Bay and Labrador. 



* The entire extent of valuable land, eligible for immediate 
settlement, near the 49th parallel, extending from Eed River to the 
Pacific, and unless by Blackfeet or Dacotahs utterly uninhabited, 
would in area equal half Europe. 

.C 



18 PROPORTION OF PRAIRIE TO FOREST. 

As neither colony is as yet surveyed, it is impossible 
to state with accuracy the proportion that the open or 
available land in either colony bears to the waste : 
generally speaking, the tracts of land which are con- 
demned as waste and unprofitable, are such as have 
not been surveyed, and exploration and settlement have 
invariably led to the discovery of tracts of open land 
where least expected. Of the land in either colony, 
the portion occupied (some thousands of acres out of 
150 millions), is so small compared with the whole, 
that a considerable time must elapse before settlers 
arriving shall find it difficult to obtain farm sites con- 
taining a sufficient quantity of open land. In addition 
to this, an ample supply of timber, for building, fencing, 
&c, is indispensable in a farm ; and the quantity required 
for fuel only, is surprising. 

Of Vancouver Island the southern portion only has 
been examined, and it is found to contain 100,000 acres 
of valuable farming land in the immediate vicinity of 
Victoria, extending to Cowichan, which again is found 
to contain about the same quantity of open land, which 
adjoins some 30,000 acres of open land at Nanaimo, 
and plains at intervals are found extending to Cape 
Mudge ; that is to say, for 150 miles measured along 
the coast Vancouver Island has been explored, and 
the capability of this portion of the island to support 
in affluence a large population is admitted, while a 
conclusion the very opposite to this is arrived at with 
regard to other portions of the island which have not 
been explored. 

Similarly, in British Columbia, open plains of great 
extent are known to exist in the valleys of the Pitt 
Eiver, the Fraser, the Similkamen, and the Thomson. 
At Langley and Kamloops, the Kootanie and the 



SOIL — FLORA. 19 

Columbia, and every addition to our knowledge of the 
country tells favourably on the ratio in question. 

The soil, where it is richest, in the river deltas, the 
valleys, and the plains, usually consists of black vegetable 
mould, six inches to three feet in depth, overlying a 
deep substratum of clay, gravel, or sand ; it is generally 
covered with a luxuriant crop of fern, which is very 
difficult to kill and tedious to eradicate. The native 
grasses of the country are of a poor Alpine character, 
springing up early in April and dying away in Septem- 
ber ; swamp grass excepted, which supports the stock 
of the country in winter, but which is too coarse and 
woody in the fibre to fatten them. This deficiency is, 
however, to a great extent counterbalanced by native 
tares, clover, and vetches, which are, in most localities, 
abundant. The open grounds, also, grow berries of 
many kinds, and roots, such as onions, kamass, &c, on 
which the Indian, to a great extent, subsists. 

In many places the wild flowers of England, and the 
common garden flowers, such as lilies, lupins, orchids, 
&c, occur in profusion, and blossoming shrubs of infi- 
nite variety. All that is known of the Flora is derived 
from a few specimens, not a dozen, collected by Men- 
zies years ago ; but as soon as sufficient time shall have 
elapsed to have examined the beautiful collection of 
Dr. Lyall, and those of Captain Palliser and Mr. Jef- 
frey, a cheap work on the Flora of the whole of the 
British Possessions in North America, from the able 
pen of Sir William Hooker, is expected. Sir William 
writes : " The botany of the coasts is, no doubt, very 
similar to that of the main land and valley of the 
Columbia, pretty fully described in the Flora Boreali 
Americana. It is on the mountains and the west coast 
that a difference will be found." 



20 CHOPS. 

While mentioning shrubs, could not the north-west 
tea plant, which covers whole swamps, be turned to 
account ?■ — the leaf resembles tea, the flavour not bad, 
and the effect exhilarating. Some years ago the Hud- 
son's Bay Company imported a cargo, but it was 
stopped at the custom-house and, to avoid duty, 
thrown overboard ; but if the plant is quite distinct 
from the real tea plant, it is possible that the customs 
could not have prevented its introduction free of duty. 

To the swamps we are also indebted for the cran- 
berry, which, for preserves, is fast becoming an article 
of export, principally to San Francisco. 

I have omitted to mention strawberries, raspberries of 
three kinds, sallal, bearberries, similar to those of Scot- 
land, blueberries, native currants and gooseberries, &c., 
as indigenous ; important inasmuch as they add to the 
many points of similarity which strike us on comparing 
these colonies with home. 

The fertility of the soil in the neighbourhood of the 
gold-bearing rocks is very remarkable, and is indicated 
rather by the production from ordinary seed of gigantic 
roots, and vegetables, and fruits, than by crops of grain. 

Turnips as large as hassocks, radishes as large as 
beets or mangolds, and bushels of potatoes to a single 
stalk, are nothing astonishing. It is the same all along 
the coast as far south as San Francisco, where, at their 
agricultural exhibition, pumpkins 200 lbs., to 250 lbs., 
and a squash weighing 400 lbs. have been exhibited. 
At the house of an ex-consul at San Francisco I have 
seen Oregon pears, to demolish one of which' required 
the united effort of five guests ; the apples being large 
in proportion. These monsters are not usually wanting 
either in flavour or solidity : although I must confess 
my own opinion is that almost everything, in a new 



FRUITS. 21 

country, is wanting in intensity compared with Eng- 
land. It is certain, for instance, that the game is not so 
juicy, that the flowers do not smell so sweetly, that the 
birds do not sing so well, and even the sting of the 
wasp is more quickly forgotten. Oregon apples and 
pears are in great demand in San Francisco, because 
they keep better the farther north they are grown. 
The Americans are an apple-loving people, and their 
consumption of them is astonishing. The British colo- 
nies are too far north to compete with the vineyards of 
Los Angelos, or the peaches of Obispo, but they may 
reasonably expect to assist Washington and Oregon in 
supplying the south with English fruits. Orchards in 
the colonies will be very remunerative. Those in 
Oregon have the disadvantage of being situated in the 
centre of the state, and fruit has to be carried to 
the Wilhamette Eiver, and thence by steamers from 
Portland. 

An acre of land planted with 200 apple trees, 
would, at the end of three years, on a minute calcula- 
tion, cost a proprietor 30/. to 40/., and the lowest 
selling price on the coast, of an acre of apple trees of 
that age, is 200Z. The intermediate trees are chopped 
out with an axe as the orchard becomes too crowded. 

Hops grow well in the country, and a brewery on a 
large scale would pay well, as any one interested may 
satisfy himself, by noticing the cargoes of bottled ale 
and stout sent from England to that coast. Native 
hemp (Ortica canabina) grows wild in many places, par- 
ticularly round the Indian lodges. Some of the fibre 
was sent to H. M.'s dockyards, and was there tested 
and pronounced quite equal to Eussian. I should not 
think that to cultivate it would pay as well as to grow 
common crops, such as wheat, oats, barley; but it 

c 3 



22 FERTILITY ACCOUNTED FOR. 

might pay well to trade it from the Indians at the 
proper season, and export to England the raw material, 
as the experiment above mentioned is sufficient to 
show that it is not deteriorated by the voyage. 

It has been somewhere stated, by Sir Charles Lyell, 
that volcanic rocks produce, by their disintegration, a 
remarkably fertile soil : that their component ingre- 
dients, silica, alumina, lime, potash, iron, and the rest, 
are in the proportions best adapted for vegetation, 
which may in part account for the extraordinary pro- 
ductiveness mentioned : and we may reasonably doubt 
whether the sandstone districts will be found to produce 
results so unexpected. The same idea is repeated in 
the " British Quarterly " of 1851, which speaks of the 
facility with which volcanic rocks lend themselves 
to cultivation and to the natural growth of vegetation ; 
and adds, that perhaps no parts of the world arc more 
richly cultivated or support a larger population than 
the neighbourhoods of Vesuvius and iEtna. Now, it 
will be recollected that the general character of the 
rocks in these colonies is igneous or volcanic. On 
the Columbia, I was much struck by the appearance 
of occasional basaltic masses, crowning some eminence 
above the river, rising above the forest, .and at the 
moment, from their columnal structure and time-worn 
look, suggesting some ancient stronghold on the Ehine. 
Mount Baker is occasionally active : in 1853, 1 noticed, 
in company with others, a beautiful sheet of flame 
issuing from its summit, and this may perhaps account 
for sounds, too loud for the crash of falling timber, 
occasionally heard by travellers in the Eocky Moun- 
tains, and for plains, the surfaces of which are covered 
with small stones, differing widely from those imme- 
diately underneath. 



COST OF CLEARING LAND. 23 

Tlie profits arising from the cultivation of grain 
crops and grasses are far from inconsiderable. 

Open grass lands can of course be ploughed up at 
once, and a crop obtained. Fern lands require to be 
ploughed in the heat of summer, in order, by fermen- 
tation, to kill the fern, and to destroy, by exposure, 
bulbous roots, such as crocuses, kamass, &c, for which 
purpose pigs make admirable pioneers. To clear pine 
lands is not very difficult, being very resinous they 
burn up readily, and are easily overturned, as the roots 
do not descend but creep along the ground ; in which 
respect, these trees stand like pawns upon a chess- 
board. Oak is more difficult to eradicate, as the roots 
go straight down. Marsh lands are usually easily 
drained, and reclaimed by burning them up in summer ; 
these lands afterwards produce the best crops. The 
cost of clearing an acre of timbered land may be taken 
at SI.; of the other descriptions less, varying with the 
locality. An acre of land produces from twenty to 
forty bushels of wheat, or a corresponding quantity 
of oats or barley, and continues to do so for some 
years without manure before it is exhausted ; hitherto, 
wheat has sold in the colony at Ss. the bushel, oats 
at 6 s. Hay pays remarkably well, varying in price 
during the year from SI. to 16/., or more, per ton. 

For meat and vegetables the miners and the British 
fleet, which are supphed by public contract, afford a 
ready market. Indians everywhere grow potatoes, and 
carrots as far north as Queen Charlotte's Island ; their 
plan is to repeat the crop until the ground is exhausted, 
and then to clear some more. The potatoes are ex- 
cellent ; and potatoes and salmon their standing dish. 
Meat in the colony is dear, Is. to Ihd. per lb. 9 which 
to the consumer is counterbalanced by the remarkably 

c 4 



24 LIVE STOCK. 

low price of teas, wine, spirits, and cigars ; in conse- 
quence of Victoria being a free port. 

Stock. 

Of stock, every variety, good, bad, and indifferent, 
can be procured on the coast. 

The American horned cattle are particularly fine, 
and numbers of Durhams and Devons have been im- 
ported to San Francisco ; the Spanish cattle, which 
are the most numerous, are smaller, and very like 
the Guernseys at home. 

The California sheep are hairy-looking animals, with 
long horns and long legs ; but they have lately begun 
to improve the breed by importing merinos and South- 
Downs, principally from Vancouver Island, where the 
best breeds are abundant. 

The native horses of the country make admirable 
saddle hacks, and are most enduring, but have a 
singular repugnance to draught. The carriage horse 
is constantly met with. In addition to these, Cali- 
fornia can boast of a breed of racehorses of English 
origin, thoroughbred or nearly so, and of great bone 
and sinew ; they seldom run their best horses for less 
than four mile heats, a part of which, it is said, will 
be done at one minute and fifty seconds the mile * ; 
the original stock of these horses was taken at different 
times across the isthmus, which, from New York, costs 
from 75/. to 100/. ; and taking into account how na- 
tural to the horse the climate on the Pacific is, and how 
well adapted to his development such a sod as that 
which overspreads the valleys of Santa Clara and San 

* This may be true. The Derby of 1860 was, I think, run at 
the rate of V 57" the mile ; but the horses alluded to in the text 
are aged. See Appendix, page 162. 



TIMBER. 25 

Jose is, I shall not be surprised if, at no distant period, 
California • should produce the finest racehorses in the 
world. 

Horses of the character of the English dray horse, 
Clydesdale, or the Suffolk Punch, have not yet reached 
the country. 

To have attempted a minute description of an area 
so extended as that embraced by these colonies, would 
have exceeded the limits of this publication. To com- 
pensate for this deficiency I propose, in the Appendix, 
from the unpublished journals of myself or others, to 
give the results of some recent explorations ; merely 
premising that in no case ought one scrap of a country 
to be regarded as a specimen of the whole, any more 
than Wales is a sample of England, or the Wicklow 
hills of the open plains of Meath or Tipperary. 

Timber. 

The largest trees yet discovered on the Pacific 
coast resemble cedar, but are of the cypress kind ; they 
are found at Mariposa and Calaveras, and measure 
upwards of 30 feet in diameter, and nearly 400 feet in 
height. No pines have been met with as large as 
these. Near Humboldt I noticed a forest of firs (which 
resembled the Douglas, but had smaller foliage and 
cones), in which a diameter of from 14 to 15 feet, and 
a corresponding height, was not uncommon. A few 
trees of the Douglas kind, of similar size, are found 
on the banks of the Columbia. In the British colonies, 
trees exceeding 9 or 10 feet in diameter, and 270 or 
300 feet in height, are rarely met with. In the very 
large trees, alluded to as being found south of 49°, the 
annual rings are large and soft, and the timber com- 
paratively weak. 



26 TIMBEE. 

, In this respect, the timber north of 49°, being of 
more moderate dimensions, has decidedly an advan- 
tage. There the Douglas fir, which, with the silver 
fir (grandis), is the most abundant on the coast, will, 
I should think, prove, on being properly tested, to be 
the strongest fir or .pine in existence. Broken in a 
gale, the stem is splintered to a height of 20 feet at least : 
and when being hewn down, it is astonishing to observe 
how small a portion of the trunk will withstand the 
leverage of the whole tree. On account of the quan- 
tity of resin it contains, the timber is exceedingly 
durable. The bark resembles cork, is often 8 or 
9 inches thick, and makes a capital fire. H.M.S. 
Thetis, was sparred with it, — I am not aware with 
what result. If the wood is not too heavy, I should 
think it will make the best spars in the service. On 
the banks of Mtinat Inlet and elsewhere, forests of 
the Menzies pine occur, very suitable in point of size 
for first-class spars ; this wood appears to work beauti- 
fully. Hemlock spruce [Canadensis), from which laths 
are made, is very common. The banks of the Co- 
lumbia, near Colville, appear to grow ponderosa almost 
exclusively. A small pine (inops), a portion of the bark 
of which Indians eat, is constantly met with near water, 
whether in the lowest swamps, or basins on mountain- 
tops. The Weymouth pine (Strobus) is common every 
where. The P. Nootkatensis I have not met with. 
These are but a few of the firs or pines which are 
generally met with. A series of experiments to test 
their physical properties has been commenced, but is as 
yet too incomplete for publication. 

Although spar timber is common everywhere, the 
trees grow larger and straighter in the still valleys bor- 
dering on the Gulf of Georgia, than where more exposed 
on the coast. 



FISHERIES. 27 

There are two occasions on which touring in a pine 
forest is far from entertaining : viz. in a storm, when 
tree after tree, with a noise like thunder, comes crash- 
ing to the ground ; and secondly, when the forest is on 
fire. It is difficult to conceive anything more dismal 
than the appearance of charred and branchless forests 
where fires have swept. It is not uncommon in 
autumn, to see the country in this way iUmninated by 
a blaze extending for miles in every direction, 

Of oak there are two kinds ; the timber is weak, 
and the trees usually show symptoms of decay. 

If curled maple is in England valuable for furniture, 
as I am told it is, it may be of service to some one to 
know, that it grows in abundance on the banks of the 
rivers in these colonies. 

The trunks of the arbutus grow very large, and the 
wood in colour and texture so much resembles box, 
that for many purposes it might supply the uses of the 
latter. It is, however, specifically lighter. 

The country also produces cedar or rather cypress 
(Cupressus thyoides), juniper, yew, birch, poplar, 
sorbis, &c., but I never noticed ash, beech, or elm. 

Fisheries. 

Situated as these colonies are, within the limits of 
the whaling grounds, they are certain, when a little 
more advanced, to become the resort of that portion at 
least of whalers which follows the right whale north of 
forty-five degrees. At present the whaling fleet, several 
hundred in number, pass by Victoria, since it has no 
dock to offer them, no certainty of supplies of provisions 
or tackle, nor facilities to repair them, and refit or 
winter at the Port of Honolulu. A few of them find 



28 FISHERIES. 

their way to San Francisco ; but there supplies are too 
expensive, and port charges and pilotage too high, to 
entice any number of them from wintering at Oahu. 

Of small fish, salmon in millions ascend the rivers ; 
the most valuable is that which is taken from the 
middle of April to the end of July : this is succeeded 
by a small eight pounds salmon, which is taken from 
June to August. The next is a large white salmon. 
These three kinds are usually taken in main streams or 
in large lakes. Besides these there are the striped 
salmon, the hunchback, the hook-nose, and salmon 
trout in infinite variety. So dense are the shoals of 
salmon that ascend these rivers, that they can often be 
taken with a strong hook tied to a stick. The Indian 
lets his canoe float down the stream, and with a small 
landing net lifts them in. From the banks, the bear 
secures as many as he requires with his paws. None 
ever return ; they spawn, the waters receding leave 
them in the bushes, and the banks are covered with 
the dead. They are found of all weights, up to fifty 
pounds. In flavour the best kinds are equal to those 
of Europe, and in richness superior ; the other kinds 
are not so good. They can be taken with bait in salt 
water, but not in the rivers. As the coast Indians live 
on them, they catch them in a great variety of ways ; 
in weirs variously and ingeniously constructed, in 
baskets fixed to receive them where they leap. In 
shallow water they spear them, and in deep decoy them 
to the surface. I have also seen a whole camp of 
Indians occupied stoning them in shallow water. 

Sturgeon, often of enormous size, are found in 
abundance on the sand bars at the entrance of the 
rivers. Soup made from them is rich, and resembles 
turtle. Isinglass is, of course, a drug in the market. 



GAME. 29 

Besides the above, the waters abound with halibut, 
cod, skate, flounders, herrings, dog fish, and others too 
numerous to recollect. 

Large cray fish are found, but not lobsters ; oysters 
are abundant. 

Game. 

Foremost among the inducements to the middle 
classes to emigrate to these colonies is the consideration 
that they can there enjoy many recreations, such as 
horse exercise, shooting, fishing, &c, which at home 
are attended with so much expense. 

All the pleasures that can be derived from renting a 
moor or owning a deer park in Scotland, from sup- 
porting gamekeepers, resisting poachers, or incurring 
licences, from tipping whips, or feeing ostlers, are 
trivial compared with the sport within the reach of a 
settler with moderate means on the Pacific Coast ; to 
say nothing of game being there, in an economical 
point of view, a very important item. 

For simplification sake, let us omit the buffalo as too 
distant, grizzlies or brown bears as too fierce, and 
mountain goats and sheep, as too wild and inaccessible 
in their retreats among the mountains.' 

If large game is an attraction, elk, the size of a 
Kerry cow, can readily be met with on the coast. Keep- 
ing to windward of them, they are not difficult to 
approach ; and once within the band, and a shot fired, 
they become confused, and an easy prey to the hunter. 
The antlers are five feet or so in width, and weigh 
upwards of thirty pounds ; the meat is excellent. Like 
all the deer tribe, they are found in winter in valleys 
near the coast, and in the heat of summer prefer 
central lakes and hill-tops, where they can catch the 



30 LAKGE GAME. 

breeze, and avoid the flies, which would otherwise 
torment them. 

Deer, being capital swimmers, prefer the groups of 
small islands to the mainland, and a party of half a 
dozen hunters will, after an absence of a fortnight or 
three weeks, occasionally bring back to Victoria as 
many as thirty or forty, weighing lOOlbs. to 1501bs. 
each. The Indians snare them in pitfalls, and kill them 
in traps. But the slaughter is greatest in snow crusted 
over with ice, strong enough to bear a man, but which 
the pointed foot of the deer, aided by its spring, too 
readily penetrates, and the animal is soon overtaken. 
The venison is seldom so good as that of the parks in 
England. 

The black bear too is easily met with, and is never 
known to attack till wounded, or in defence of cubs ; 
some are very large. If young, the flesh is excellent, 
but rather too like pork ; but old bear is tough, and 
the strong smell, which no amount of cooking can 
neutralise, is far from enticing. They are generally 
seen where berries are abundant, or among charred 
stumps of their own colour, and usually stand up to 
look at an intruder before decamping, presenting a 
capital mark to fire at. They are difficult .to kill, and 
even when shot through the heart, are active for some 
time after. 

To see one of these animals steeple-chasing over the 
fallen timber of the forest, or spring up a tree in its 
native state, it is difficult to conceive its being similar 
to that we have seen so tame and spiritless in the 
menagerie, and conclude that there, though the body 
was living, " the heart must have been dead." 

The Puma, formidable as it looks, is far from coura- 
geous ; it will dart up a tree from the smallest dog. 



FEATHERED GAME. 31 

To sheep it is very destructive ; once within the fold it 
seizes them successively by the throat and rapidly 
sucks the blood ; even a man would be in danger if 
asleep in the vicinity of one. 

The wolves are of different colours, and larger than a 
Newfoundland dog ; they are excessively shy. 

To meet with any large game the sportsman has 
now, as might be expected, to go several miles from 
the settlement. His equipment for this purpose should 
consist of a double rifle with one sight, adjusted for 
point blank shooting only, with strong charge, up to 
100 yards, a hunting knife, and ammunition, an oil 
skin and blanket, and an Indian or two to carry the 
game and keep the track, retracing, if required, in 
which department they excel. Dogs, unless remarkably 
well trained, are better dispensed with. 

Of feathered game the duck-shooting is decidedly 
the best sport upon the coast. Of these there are fifteen 
or more different kinds ; the best are found at river 
deltas and in swamps, where, as you walk, they con- 
tinue to rise straight up, often at the sportsman's feet. 
Away from the settlement a good shot has killed thirty 
and forty in a day. A good retriever is indispensable, 
and I may add that there is nothing like an Eley cart- 
ridge and large bore for taking them down. 

Geese of several sorts are also abundant, so much so 
that in places I have seen Indian boys stalk and kill 
them with bows and arrows. At night too they 
sometimes steal upon a flock, rushlight in hand, and 
wring the necks of a considerable number. But the 
greatest numbers of wild fowl are killed in this curious 
way : The Indians observe the path in air, at the 
entrance of a river or elsewhere, through which dense 
flocks of wild fowl pass. While the birds are at rest 



32 BIRDS. 

or feeding, a net is fixed vertically at the proper level, 
being attached to poles planted some hundreds of feet 
apart. The birds are suddenly startled, and fly against 
the net with such rapidity, that they fall stupefied, and 
are easily clubbed by Indians, who rush upon them from 
an ambush close by. A punt gun and swivel, with 
which to supply the market, would, even as a specula- 
tion, succeed. 

Swans are very wary and difficult to bag ; they are 
found sometimes on the lakes, sometimes on salt water. 
At the head of Alberni canal I saw five together. 

The coast shooting has this great advantage over the 
grouse shooting, that the inconvenience of struggling 
through the bush is avoided. 

The dusky grouse is large, two and a half pounds 
weight, sits all day drumming in a pine top or cleft in 
a rock, and at night and morning comes down to feed. 

The willow grouse is smaller, of a brown colour, and 
is generally found in the neighbourhood of water. 

Both are scarce near the settlements, being very 
easily shot, as if missed on rising, they settle in the 
nearest tree. Of either, even far from the settlement, 
it is difficult to bag more than five to ten brace. A 
good pointer is indispensable, as they lie. very close. 
Snipe, on the contrary, increase with cultivation ; in one 
field I put up forty or fifty. Besides the above, tall, 
buff cranes, standing four or five feet high, are stalked 
in the plains, and make good soup. 

It is interesting to observe the rapid increase of 
small birds near the settlements in proportion as buds 
of prey, such as eagles, hawks, kites, &c, are scared 
away. In this way flocks of wild pigeons, doves of 
two kinds, three varieties of thrush, meadow larks, 
several kinds of sparrows, wrens, humming-birds, torn- 



LAND ON WHAT TERMS OBTAINABLE. 33 

tits, and a bird that sings at night, evidently prefer 
quarters near a homestead to a precarious subsistence 
in the wilderness. 



Mode and Terms of Sale of Lands. 

As it is highly probable that the enactments and 
regulations under which lands are, in Vancouver Island, 
obtainable, will very shortly be assimilated to those of 
British Columbia, it will be sufficient here to detail the 
very liberal land arrangements adopted in the latter 
colony in January last. 

By this law, any British subject may acquire 160 
acres of unoccupied land, in anticipation of survey, in 
any part of British Columbia : excepting only such 
portions as are reserved by Government for public 
purposes, such as town sites, Indian reserves, or as may 
be required for mining. To acquire a good, inalienable 
claim to a perfect title, it is only necessary for the 
claimant to take possession as soon as he makes his 
selection, reporting the fact in writing to the nearest 
magistrate, with a description of the boundaries. On 
taking possession, he pays nothing for the land, but 
has to pay a small fee for recording the claim. When 
the land shall have been surveyed by the Government, 
the claimant or his heirs acquire a title from Govern- 
ment, on payment of a sum not to exceed 10«s. per 
acre, but which it is expected will be reduced to bs. 
per acre. This will of course depend on the decision 
of the Imperial Government. 

With a view to encourage improvement, a person in 
possession can sell his land as soon as he shall have 
effected improvements to the value of 10s. per acre ; 
this condition complied with, he can pass a good title 



34 PRE-EMPTION OF LANDS. 

to the purchaser. The claimant can, in addition to the 
160 acres so acquired, purchase at any time any ad- 
ditional quantity of land he pleases, at a price not ex- 
ceeding 10s. an acre, of which bs. per acre is paid down, 
and the rest at the time of survey, if demanded. As a 
considerable time must elapse before these lands can be 
surveyed, persons taking up land promptly, may be years 
in possession before they are called upon for payment. 

Land so taken up and afterwards abandoned, may 
be claimed and taken up by any other person on the 
original terms, even if improved by the first occupant. 

Persons so occupying land have the same legal 
remedies of action of ejectment and trespass against 
intruders, as if they had paid for the land and obtained 
an indenture. 

Questions of boundaries or disputes with neighbours, 
are referred to the nearest magistrate to be disposed 
of in a summary way, but with an appeal to the higher 
courts. 

The law gives to aliens, who shall take the oath of 
allegiance, the same rights and privileges as to British 
subjects. 

Acquiring land in this way, previous to paying for 
it, is technically called pre-empting. This system was 
first adopted in America, some twenty years ago, nomi- 
nally asa" relief law," in order to justify certain cases of 
occupation on a large scale, without previous permission, 
of federal lands. In more than one sense it was a relief 
law, inasmuch as it relieved the Government of what 
would have been otherwise a source of considerable em- 
barrassment. 

Sale of land is after all only the levying of a direct and 
immediate tax on one class of the population : and it 
was soon found, that by removing as far as possible 



APPEAL TO TPIE BRITISH PRESS. 35 

this, and every other impediment and restriction 
tending to retard the settlement of the country, the 
revenue was in reality increased by the influx of a 
taxable population. It was also argued, that the ad- 
vantages and profits arising from the first settlement of 
a new country, ought to be enjoyed by the early 
settlers ; that they have peculiar hardships and priva- 
tions to undergo, especial dangers and labours to en- 
counter, and, therefore, that to these the law ought not 
to contemplate any competition, except from other 
actual settlers in selecting the most fertile lands and the 
choicest spots. Such was the basis of the American 
Act of September 4th, 1841, which, by several sub- 
sequent statutes, they have brought into perfect 
working order. It was no longer considered necessary 
to hold colonial lands, to a certain extent, in trust, to 
benefit the future redundant population of the country — 
generations yet unborn — and it was concluded that 
posterity should take care of itself. 

The act which refers to British Columbia, is inserted 
in the Appendix, and objections taken to portions of it, 
which will require re-modelling before the whole 
can be brought into working order ; but these are trifles 
compared with the wisdom of the measure itself, and 
the spirit of extreme liberality in which it is conceived ; 
and it is to be hoped that the press will assist in pro- 
mulgating it for the information of farmers possessed 
of moderate capital, and therefore but moderate profits 
in Great Britain. 



D 2 



36 



CHAP. III. 

MINERALS AND ROCKS. GOLD IN BRITISH COLUMBIA, VANCOUVER 

ISLAND, AND QUEEN CHARLOTTE'S ISLAND. COAL ON THE PACIFIC. 

IRON. COPPER. PLUMBAGO. LIMESTONE. SANDSTONE. 

MARBLE, AND VARIOUS COLOURED EARTHS. SALT SPRINGS, &C. 

The wide distribution of gold in British Columbia is 
very striking : traversing the country diagonally from 
north to south, the Fraser Eiver everywhere passes 
through a gold country. The same may be said of 
Thomson's Eiver, and of the Columbia north of 49°. 
A glance at the map shows the aggregate length of 
these rivers to be much more than 1000 miles. As a 
rule, the gold is found in much smaller particles, and 
less in quantity nearer the mouths of these rivers, and 
both size and quantity increase as we ascend them. 
At Colvile, for instance, gold is found in almost any 
part of the surrounding country, but not quite coarse 
enough to pay for working. In the neighbourhood 
of Fort Thomson, Shoushwap and Kamloops Lakes, 
gold in quantity was first discovered and reported by 
Indians. For a considerable time Yale was the centre 
of attraction, afterwards Bridge Eiver and the forks : 
but the vicinity of Fort George and Fort Alexandria, 
and the slopes of the mountain range in which the 
Quesnel Eiver rises, are now found to contain, in the 
greatest quantity, the coarsest gold. 

As to the produce of the country in this respect, and 
the success that an intending emigrant miner may 
fairly be led to anticipate, I take the liberty to de- 
nounce in the strongest terms, as unfair and calcu- 



GOLD MINING AS AN AVOCATION. 37 

lated to mislead, the maimer in which this part of the 
subject is treated in most books written on gold 
countries ; which, if I were to follow, I should com- 
mence by enumerating the several successes of Brown, 
Jones, and Eobinson ; tell how Peter's eyes sparkled 
while he picked u a pocket" in a rock, and how in 
a valley exceeding in grandeur anything he had met 
before, Jenkins washed out so many cents to the pan. 
I could, without any sacrifice of truth, produce instances 
of several persons who realised, during a mining season, 
some 400/. or 500/. each, but unless I also recorded 
many a sad instance of failure, of constitutions ruined, 
and disappointed expectation, the induction would be 
useless, a wrong impression conveyed, and the exceed- 
ingly precarious nature of mining as an avocation lost 
sight of, ending with the disappointment of the inexpe- 
rienced and the sanguine. 

This remark will perhaps apply with greater force 
to British Columbia than to any other known gold 
country. Gold mining is laborious everywhere, but 
there, owing to the want of main lines of road, the 
labour is greatly increased. Sometimes, with the 
tracking line passed across his shoulders, the miner 
drags his boat or canoe against a swift current, often 
wading up to his waist in water. At other times we 
meet him toiling up some very rugged hill with a 
month's provisions on his back. And what has been the 
result ? Since mining began in British Columbia in 
1858, the miner's average earnings have not exceeded 
100/. or so a-year, while the cost of living is at least 
60/. a-year. An intending emigrant should dismiss 
from his mind any instances of extraordinary successes 
he may have heard of. Suppose he has become acci- 
dentally acquainted with an authenticated casj of a 

D 3 



38 GOLD FIELDS OF BRITISH COLUMBIA. 

man making five or ten times more than the average in 
a season, such an instance only argues 5 or 10 to 1 
against his (the intending emigrant) realising anything. 

In 1858 the greatest monthly shipment of gold from 
British Columbia was $235,000 and the least was about 
$6000, and the total product of the gold mines for that 
year was estimated at $1,494,211 (vide Gazette, April 
19th, 1859). From data before me I believe the 
amount mined in 1859 to have been about $2,000,000 ; 
but to be moderate, assume the product of the two years 
at $3,000,000 ; the number of miners actually at work at 
any time in the country cannot have exceeded 3000, as 
the mining licences show (Gazette, June 9th, 1859, esti- 
mates them at 2000) ; which gives the miner's average 
annual earning at 100/., as I before stated. 

In California the average earnings are about half as 
much, but the country is open and accessible, and 
therefore the means of living and creature-comforts 
much more plentiful, which leads the miner to prefer 
it far to British Columbia, notwithstanding the higher 
pay in the latter. 

To make this clear, I estimate the working miners of 
California now at 200,000, and shall give the data on 
which I do so. The " Price Current " of December 31st, 
1854, when the population of California was, in round 
numbers, 300,000, estimated the number of miners 
then in the State at 80,000 to 100,000 ; since then the 
population of the State has been increased chiefly 
by immigration, at the rate of 30,000 to 40,000 per 
annum, principally from the labouring classes, and is now 
not far short of 600,000, two-thirds* of whom are 

* The New York Herald, copied by Morning Chronicle, March 
5th, 1860, makes the population of California exceed a million, — 
a manifest exaggeration 



GOLD FIELDS OF CALIFORNIA. 39 

estimated by Mr. Greeley to be able-bodied men.* On 
these grounds I am safe in putting down the number of 
miners as above stated. 

The yield of these mines is now, with tolerable re- 
gularity, $50,000,000 annually ; and this will show that 
the British Columbia gold fields, however inaccessible, 
are twice as profitable to the miner, as the California 
gold fields are. 

In stating the average of the latter, as I have done, at 
50 1, per man per annum, it may be objected, that they 
cannot five, finding tools, quicksilver, mules, clothes, &c., 
on so little : to this I reply that 40,000 or 50,000 of 
their number realise a mere subsistence from min- 
ing, and are therefore ready, on the vaguest rumour and 
the shortest notice, to start for Victoria, Denver, Sonora, 
or the south, with a view to- participate in the profits 
of any enterprise that may offer. 

The surface diggings of California are now consider- 
ably exhausted, and the yield of the mines less by 
nearly $9,000,000, than it was in 1853, while the 
population has been all along rapidly increasing. Ad- 
ditional force is given to the statement that the surface 
mines are partially exhausted, by the fact, that while 
the annual yield of gold is on the decline, quartz mills 
are now numerous, and quartz companies far more 
successful than heretofore. 

The editor of the New York Tribune seemed to sus- 
pect this, when in 1859 he wrote as follows : — 

" I do not suppose that the gold mines of California 
will ever be thoroughly worked out ; certainly not in 
the next thousand years. Yet I do not anticipate any 
considerable increase in the annual production, because 
I deem $50,000,000 per annum as much as can be 
* Overland Journey. New York, 1860, p. 355. 

D 4 



40 



EXHAUSTIBILITY OF SURFACE GOLD. 



taken out at a profit under existing circumstances. 
The early miners of California reaped what nature had 
been quietly saving through countless thousands of 
years. Through the action of frost and fire, growth and 
decay, air and water, she had been slowly wearing 
down the primitive rocks in which the gold was ori- 
ginally deposited, washing away the fighter matter, and 
concentrating the gold thus gleaned from cubic miles of 
stubborn quartz and granite, into a few cubic feet of 
earth at the bottom of her water courses. Many a 
miner has thus taken out in a day, gold which could 
not in weeks have been extracted from the rocks where 
it first grew. The hills in which it is now mainly 
found, can be washed down at a dollar or less per 
cubic yard, by the best hydraulic appliances ; but 
when the miner is brought face to face with the rough 
granite the case is bravely altered." 



SHIPMENTS OF CALIFORNIAN GOLD. 



1851 . 

1852 . 

1853 . 

1854 . 

1855 . 


34,492,000 
. 45,779,000 
54,935,000 
50,973,968 
45,182,631 


1856 

1857 
1858 
1859 


• 


50,697,434 
47,215,398 
46,503,632 
45,989,890 




POPULATION OF CALIFORNIA. 


- 


1850 . 
1852 . 


. 92,597 
. 264,435 


1854—55 
1859—60 


. 300,000 
. 600,000 



If in California ten or twelve years has so con- 
siderably reduced the profits of surface m inin g, Ave 
may expect in British Columbia, within a like period, 
a similar result. 

The surface gold is the great inducement to the 
labourer to come to the country ; it requires a capi- 
talist to work in quartz. 

In California, farms to supply the surface diggers 



A GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY. 41 

became with them concurrently established, and the 
population took immediate root in the country, which 
was naturally open, fertile, and unimpeded. 

In British Columbia we have the diggers, but owing 
to the want of natural or made roads, and the country 
being heavily timbered and rough, we see as yet no 
farming population. 

Admitting the exhaustibility of the surface gold * 
which I have shown above, the earliest efforts of legis- 
lation ought to be to plant a farming population in the 
country to keep pace with and supply the miners. 

Miners themselves seldom take to farming, for this 
their tastes are usually too speculative, extravagant, 
and nomadic. 

To the statesman, the existence of surface gold 
presents a grand opportunity to settle a wild country, 
but on account of its extreme exhaustibility, from the 
time of its discovery, like the Sibyl's offer, the chance 
is ever on the wane. 

When, in 1858, some 35,000 San Franciscan miners 
visited Victoria and as hastily returned, the circum- 
stance of their non-detention was by many, especially 
by the local newspapers, considered as the greatest 
misfortune that could befall the country. Had the 
country been previously adapted by open communi- 
cation, cheap land, &c, to invite with them a British 
farming population, this impression might have been 
a correct one; but, hitherto, the mines of British 
Columbia have been worked simply for the benefit 
of the merchants and shipowners of San Francisco, 
and I cannot think that, under the circumstances, Great 
Britain or the colonies have lost much by the exodus 
so much regretted. 

* Hill's Bar, for instance, washed out. 



42 GOLD IN VANCOUVER ISLAND. 

The foregoing facts show clearly that the produce 
of the mines of British Columbia, compared with the 
population hitherto at work at them, has been highly 
satisfactory, and is indeed conclusive as to their rich- 
ness ; but lest the smallness of the gross amount, com- 
pared with the produce of gold countries long esta- 
blished, should create an erroneous impression, I add 
the following remarks, taken from Mr. Waddington's 
able pamphlet on this subject : — 

" The official exports (of gold) from California to the 
Eastern States in 1849, comprehending a lapse of more 
than six months from the first discovery of gold, 
amounted only to $60,000. It is possible that as much 
more was sent to Chili and the Sandwich Islands, and 
we will suppose the same amount to have been taken 
away by private hands, though the opportunities at 
that time were few and far between. To the above 
we may add $60,000 for what remained in the country, 
and we shall reach a total of $240,000 for the pro- 
duction of California during the first six months. To 
make another comparison : — all the gold brought to 
Melbourne in 1834 amounted to 104,154 oz., or, at 
sixteen dollars per oz., $1,666,464 ; whilst New South 
Wales, which is now so productive, gave, for the first 
six months of 1846, only 45,190 oz., or $725,000." 

In Vancouver Island, although gold has in one or 
two places been actually worked, it has not yet been 
found in sufficient quantity to repay the cost of mining. 

In 1852, I broke off almost at random pieces of 
rock in various places within a walk of Victoria, and 
the report on them by Mr. James Tennant {vide Ap- 
pendix), of the Strand, will be read with interest, enu- 
merating as it does the geological formations usually 
met with in the south-eastern portion of the Island, 
and showing that it is extremely probable that Van- 



GOLD IN QUEEN CHAELOTTE'S ISLAND. 43 

couver Island, when properly explored, will be found 
a gold-producing country. 

Gold was known to exist in Queen Charlotte's Island 
as far back as 1852 ; when, in consequence of in- 
formation obtained from Indians,, the agents of the 
Hudson's Bay Company despatched the Una to the 
Island with a party of miners, drafted from the coal 
mines, well provisioned, and provided with every re- 
quisite to blast on a large scale. 

Anchored in Mitchell Harbour, on the western side 
of the Island, a valuable quartz vein was soon dis- 
covered. It was seven inches wide, was traced for 
eighty feet, and contained twenty-five per cent, of gold 
in many places. For several days the vein was worked 
with but one bar to their success, and that a serious 
one. At every blast, the natives scrambled with the 
miners and with one another for the fragments. As 
neither side was armed, these arrangements were con- 
ducted with perfect good humour. By way of episode 
to the general engagements, both parties occasionally 
paused to witness a fair wrestling match between some 
sturdy Scotchman who had the science and any Indian 
that was ambitious to distinguish himself; and the 
miners themselves afterwards admitted that nakedness 
and fish oil often carried the day. At length the vein 
was abandoned, anchor weighed, and the Una wrecked 
and burnt on her way back to Victoria. The heaviest 
specimens of pure gold as yet obtained from Queen 
Charlotte's Island, weighed from fourteen to sixteen 
ounces. (Vide Appendix.) 

Coal on the Pacific. 

The consumption of coal at the Pacific is enormous, 
perhaps 200,000 tons a year. San Francisco alone, in 



44 COAL ON THE PACIFIC. 

1859, imported 79,722 tons, and the quantity consumed 
that year amounted to 69,258 tons. In connection with 
the Panama Eailway (on both sides), some seventy 
steamers ply, the combined tonnage of which is not far 
short of 100,000 tons. I mention these facts to show 
that the above-mentioned statement is not an exaggera- 
tion. The Pacific coasts produce, in many places, coal 
of good quality, but have not as yet supplied more than 
10 per cent, of the consumption ; of this 10 per cent, 
the principal part has been supplied by Chili, the pro- 
duce of the North Pacific coal mines being, up to the 
present time, positively insignificant. 

It is all very well to say, as is so frequently the case, 
" In nothing does Vancouver Island resemble England 
more than in the extensive deposits of coal which she 
possesses," but we might add, in nothing does she 
differ from England more than in the small production 
and sale of them. 

Discoveries of coal in the neighbourhood of Mary's 
ville, Stockton, on the Sacramento and San Joaquin 
Eivers are frequently reported in the Californian papers, 
but these invariably turn out to be mere lignite beds. 
We hear nothing now of the coal of the Umqua and Co- 
quille Eivers. Coose Bay, however, sends some coal to 
San Francisco ; the place was pointed out to me by Cap- 
tain Alden. It is about 400 miles north of San Francisco, 
on a bold, unsheltered part of that rocky coast, and to 
have called the place a bay required some nerve. The 
coal is, I believe, a mile or so inland ; I saw some of 
it at San Francisco, and it looked particularly slaty. 
The coal of the Columbia Eiver is brown in colour. I 
saw the Cowlitz coal tried in a steamer, and so great 
was the quantity of sulphur distilled from it that it 
might almost be swept off the deck. 



COAL IN VANCOUVER ISLAND. 45 

The next coal we come to as we go north is at Belling- 
ham Bay; and as this coal field is the only one on the 
Pacific in American territory, yet discovered, that can 
at all compare or compete with the coal found in the 
British settlements, I shall give a more extended de- 
scription of it. The field consists of four principal beds ; 
cropping out on the coast, dipping north, I should have 
thought, at an angle of 45° (the engineer said it dipped 
lin2). 

In quality the coal is undeniably very inferior to 
that of JSTanaimo, the beds being often mixed with shale 
and clay, and lighter in colour. The thickest bed is 
four or five feet, and not nine or ten feet as usually 
stated. The working of these beds at an angle like 
that mentioned, and roofed with clay as is generally 
the case, will be very expensive. The shores of the 
bay in which it is found are shoal all round, in fact a 
mud flat, and sea-going vessels have a difficulty in 
finding it through a labyrinth of islands, intricate pas- 
sages and uncertain currents. 

In Vancouver Island from Mtinat to Port S&n Juan, 
the northern boundary of the Straits of Juan de Fuca, 
is flat, and sandstone all along ; at Mtinat the Indians 
showed me specimens of coal ; at Sooke, a shallow 
boring passed through one inch of coal ; at Saanich 
coal is found of a bad quality in what looks like clay and 
slate. The strike of the Bellingham Bay coal from east 
to west would point to Saanich. 

About Nanaimo the prevailing rock is sandstone, 
varying in texture from the hardest conglomerate and 
millstone grit to a soft and workable building stone. 
The harbour is admirably sheltered and easily ap- 
proached ; vessels draw close alongside a wharf to 
load. There several beds of excellent coal are found, 



46 NANAIMO. 

nearly horizontal, but dipping sufficiently toward the 
south and west for drainage, and generally roofed with 
sandstone. They are all worked within fifty or sixty 
feet of the surface, and are found cropping out on the 
islands, for several miles inland, and high up the 
Nanaiino Eiver towards the interior of the island, 
which will give some idea of their vast extent. They 
are used in Her Majesty's steamers, those of the Hud- 
son's Bay Company, and the river steamers. 

The American sea-going steamers and those of the 
Pacific Mail Steamship Company do not use them ; 
this is not owing to the want of a reciprocity treaty, as 
is elsewhere shown, because, after paying duty and 
all other expenses, they can be sold in the San Fran- 
cisco market at half the price of the foreign coal 
which these steamers burn. The agents of these com- 
panies assert that the specific gravity of the coal is 
so much less than that of anthracite or English coal 
which they consume, and that they burn so fast and 
freely that they take up too much room, and require, 
in consequence, such continual stoking that to burn 
them is not economical, even at half the price of 
English coal : if this is not true it ought, by experi- 
ment, to be contradicted. If it is true, it might be 
remedied by obtaining coal at a greater depth from 
the surface, for clearly the density of the coal must be 
greater in proportion to the pressure from above under 
which it was formed. It is not true, as has been stated, 
that in burning this coal leaves behind it a good deal of 
shag ; on the contrary, it burns to a white ash. 

The Hudson's Bay Company have some forty build- 
ings and two engines at Nanaimo, giving it the appear- 
ance of a flourishing town ; there is a considerable 
quantity of mineral land in the neighbourhood unsold. 



COAL IN BRITISH COLUMBIA. 47 

Farther up the coast at Valdez Inlet we find the 
sandstone formation again ; in the inlet itself I noticed a 
seam of coal, six inches in thickness, cropping out. 

The coal found at Koskeemo, south of Beaver 
Harbour, was but eighteen inches in thickness ; there 
the sandstone is everywhere broken up by primitive 
rock, which, in that neighbourhood, predominates. 
Labour on the coast is too dear to make the working of 
any seam profitable, which does not exceed consider- 
ably eighteen inches. When I last visited the former 
workings of the Hudson's Bay Company there, the 
place was so overgrown with poplars, and every ves- 
tige of dwellings had been so removed by Indians, that 
a stranger would not have discovered that coal had 
ever been worked there. 

On the coasts of British Columbia coal has been 
discovered in several places. That within the entrance of 
Burrard canal on the south side, was known to the 
Hudson's Bay Company several years ago ; it was dis- 
covered by Mr. Henry K Peers. The beds are thin, 
and the fact that they preferred to mine on the island 
showed that their opinion of it was unfavourable. 

Coal has also been discovered in the delta of Fraser 
Eiver, but its situation is unfavourable to exclude water. 

On the Skeena river, which reaches the sea at Port 
Essington, Major Downie in 1859 claimed to have 
discovered extensive deposits of coal. 

In addition to the foregoing minerals, I would men- 
tion that I saw specimens of copper, nearly pure, taken 
from Deer Island, in the neighbourhood of Fort Eupert, 
and of iron and plumbago, taken from various parts of 
the coasts. 

Limestone is everywhere abundant, and sandstone 
of course. Blue marble is also abundant on the coast, 



48 OTHER MINERALS. 

often intersected with veins of white ; the thickest of 
these I have seen, was nine inches. I mention this 
because San Francisco pays annually for white marble 
some 15,000/., some of which, of inferior quality, is found 
at a point inland seventy-five miles from Sacramento, 
but the principal part is supplied from Vermont, by 
rail to New York and thence shipped ; it is also im- 
ported from Italy, and is principally used for mantel- 
pieces and monuments, and costs upwards of 1/. per foot 
in the rough. I should add, the coast abounds with 
earths of different colours, with which the Indians 
occasionally paint their canoes. 

I shall conclude this chapter with an instance of the 
salt springs of Vancouver Island. Salt on the coast for 
curing fish and beef, and other similar purposes, is ex- 
ceedingly valuable. The Sandwich Island salt contains 
too much lime to be used for these purposes. Liver- 
pool salt is retailed in the Sound, as high as -15 c. per 
pound; this makes the subject worth investigating. 

A gallon of water from the Nanaimo spring pro- 
duced lib. of salt (a gallon of sea water produces 
4^ oz.), the spring produced about a gallon a minute — 
the specific gravity of the water, taken roughly, was 
about 10*60. These springs will not of course compare 
with the brine springs of Worcestershire, or those of 
Utah, which contain ^ their weight in salt, but for 
the reason mentioned, the subject is not uninteresting. 
The offensive smell alluded to in the Eeport of Pro- 
fessor Taylor (vide Appendix) on two of these springs, 
arose from the decomposition which unavoidably took 
place, as the samples were bottled for nearly a year 
before they were placed in his hands. 



49 



CHAP. IV. 

CHIEF TOWNS OF VANCOUVER ISLAND AND BRITISH COLUMBIA. VICTORIA. 

LANGLEY. — NEW WESTMINSTER. HARBOURS AND FORTIFICATIONS. 

ONE BRITISH CAPITAL ON THE PACIFIC SUFFICIENT. 

Given an uninhabited country : to choose a town site 
which shall ultimately become the capital, is a puzzle, 
and might, perhaps, with advantage, be included among 
civil-service examination questions. If England were 
such a country, I risk nothing in saying, nine com- 
petent persons out of ten would not have selected 
London, nor if one did, would he have believed that 
his selection would ripen into so wonderful a result. 
Why is Dublin, with its sand-bars and mud-flats, the 
capital of Ireland ? It might bewilder a clever person 
to say why half the chief cities of Europe are not 
second-rate cities instead. 

It needs no prophet to say that British interests require 
one capital on the Pacific, so eligibly situated, that it 
shall be capable of entering into friendly competition 
with San Francisco in commerce and hi comfort ; and 
of rapidly outstripping the mushroom " cities " of the 
coast.* 

* I hope the term will be excused, as I mean no disrespect to any 
of the very beautiful cities America has built : but, on the coast, it 
is no uncommon thing for a Tap to be " inaugurated," a Newspaper 
started, a Wharf projected, and a City proclaimed ; and shortly 
after, to our astonishment, we find that the barrels have been rolled 
away, the patriotic type set to echo the grieA r ances of a different 
locality, and that the entire institution has " whittled out." In fact, 
Americans are so enterprising, that they frequently commence a 

E 



50 VICTOKIA. 

Victoria * was selected by Governor Douglas, whose 
intimate acquaintance with every crevice in the coast 
ought to carry considerable weight, as " the site " in 
1842, when he expressed his confidence "that there 
was no sea-port north of the Columbia, where so many 
advantages could be found combined;" an opinion which 
was confirmed by Sir George Simpson, in his despatch 
of June 21st, 1844, in which he states, " The situation 
of Victoria is peculiarly eligible, the country and 
climate remarkably fine, and the harbour excellent." 
And again : " June, 1846, — Fort Victoria promises to 
become a very important place." The site on the east 
side of the harbour has many advantages ; it is level, 
extensive, and clear, and from every street the view of 
distant snow-capped mountains is a picture. Eight fertile 
agricultural districts, containing 100,000 acres of con- 
nected open land, surround it. The suburbs and park 
adjacent are shaded with oak trees ; and although 

town in anticipation of events on which its future success must 
depend; and, therefore, cannot be expected to draw prizes every 
time. When, for instance, I first saw Eureka, I was standing in a 
damp forest, on the banks of a shallow and rather muddy river, and 
naturally inquired, Where ? To which my companion replied, " This 
is the city. Within a hundred yards of us stands a liquor store, it 
will be roofed in a day Or two — come and take a drink." 

* As with other inventions, copyright should extend to names of 
towns. Letters directed to Vancouver Island and Australia will no 
doubt, in time to come, be assorted on the same route, and letters 
intended for Victoria town may find their way to Victoria colony, as 
has to my knowledge occurred ; or they may be left behind at 
Victoria near New Orleans, or elsewhere. Englishmen abroad like 
their towns to be called after a member of the royal family, because 
it reminds them of institutions which distance but serves to endear. 
In this case, however, had the Queen been petitioned to name the 
chief town, as in the case of B. C, it is probable that, as a matter of 
practical convenience, a different name would have been selected. 



LANGLEY. SI 

there is no water in the town, unless what is procured 
from wells, water can be readily led into it, from 
springs and lakes in the back ground. The streets are 
broad and macadamised, and the private dwellings, 
public buildings, churches, &c, have been erected with 
so much taste, and are kept so attractively neat, that 
even now, the appearance of the town is thoroughly 
English. The houses are generally built of wood, planed, 
relieved by cornice, &c, and painted, the chimneys being 
brick, but there are a good many brick buildings as 
well. The population of Victoria is about 3000. 

Subsequently to the establishment of British Colum- 
bia as a Crown colony in 1858, the ruling authorities 
decided that a separate capital for British Columbia — 
one seaport, and that of the greatest consequence — to 
be established somewhere hi the neighbourhood of 
Fraser Eiver, was indispensable. 

A point on the left bank, nine miles from the entrance, 
was first proposed ; but afterwards abandoned (in 
November, 1858) in favour of a point sixteen miles 
further up the river, on the same side. 

The spot selected was the site of a former establish- 
ment of the Hudson's Bay Company, known as " Old 
Fort Langley." The anchorage is good, and the river 
deep enough to admit of ships being moored close into 
the bank : with a cheerful aspect and surface well 
adapted for building and drainage. The greater part 
of the site is dry and elevated, and the open lands of 
New Langley are at no great distance in the rear. A 
trail connects it with Whatcome and other American 
towns in the neighbourhood of Bellingham Bay. Here 
3000 building lots were laid out, of which 342 were 
sold in two days, for 13,000/., on which a deposit often 
per cent, was paid. A court-house, jail, parsonage, and 

E 2 



52 NEW WESTMINSTER. 

church were built, and 400 or 500 persons were about 
to commence operations, when another capital was an- 
nounced. 

The site last determined on was on the right bank, 
fifteen miles from the entrance, where the Fraser 
divides to form the north and south branches. 

No exertions were spared to found the new capital 
with eclat and stamp it with success. Engineers, mili- 
tary and civil, were for months employed projecting its 
squares and terraces. At the auction sales it was an- 
nounced that in certain quarters, its " West-end," no 
shop fronts should be admitted. Majesty itself was 
approached to find a name for it, and it was called in 
the colonies " The Phantom City." 

On perusal of the foregoing and papers in the Ap- 
pendix the idea will naturally suggest itself, that it would 
be far better if the influence of Government were exerted 
to concentrate the energies of so small a population as 
the country contains to the erection of one capital, 
whichever of them is best adapted to become the 
British depot of the commerce of the West. 

The seaboard of California is nearly double that of 
British Columbia, yet one San Francisco is found suffi- 
cient. 

Any port within Fraser Eiver, or in its neighbourhood, 
can never be the resort of sea-going vessels. Fogs and 
calms for months in autumn, the rapid currents of the 
Haro archipelago, the narrow channel passing through 
miles of shifting sand, uncertain tides, and the rapidity 
of its own current, must prevent Fraser Eiver, however 
well adapted for steam navigation, from ever becoming 
the resort of sailing vessels. 

As a town site, New Westminster is decidedly objec- 
tionable. Too elevated, expensive to grade, and 



FORTIFICATIONS. 53 

heavily timbered, its progress must necessarily be slow ; 
the extensive swamps and marshes so close to it are 
not an advantage, to say nothing of the music of acres 
of frogs in spring, and the stings of myriads of mosqui- 
toes in summer ; its impregnability may be unquestion- 
able, but if unfortunately this quality renders it inac- 
cessible to the merchantmen of the Pacific, and to the 
trade of Puget Sound, what object could an enemy have 
in attacking it? The enemies that soldiers there will have 
to contend with are depression and disease, from want 
of exercise in open grounds. Langley, which is now 
abandoned, was better circumstanced in this respect, 
and as to trade ; and the town site was clear. The 
argument in favour of separating the capital from the 
people you want to trade with by a broad and rapid 
river, lest they should at a future time become hostile, 
is at least questionable, since, assuming war, and that 
Government measures are such that we may at the same 
time assume a British population, your position on the 
foreign frontier is quite as menacing to the supposed 
enemy as theirs to you. 

Besides, the qualifications, such as accessibility, easy 
gradients to approach it by, &c, requisite to constitute 
a town site eligible for commercial purposes, are the 
opposite to those required for defence. Is a com- 
mercial community to carry fuel and water perpetually 
up hill, to be pestered with ferries and mulcted in 
clearances and gradients, and to undergo a thousand 
daily inconveniences, from a morbid apprehension of 
future attack that may never occur ? Better far, one 
would suppose, from mercantile considerations only to 
choose the site, and if in time property should accumu- 
late there, then to call upon science to fortify it.* 

* In addition to the foregoing, if San Juan or Orcas Island, 

e 3 



54 HARBOURS. 

The high open grounds between Victoria and Esqui- 
malt Harbours would be a very healthy place for a 
principal military station, and being close to the naval 
station, which the Government have so wisely selected, 
detachments of troops could, in the event of war, be 
rapidly conveyed to any point on the coast required, in 
Her Majesty's steamers, on which, after all, should such 
a calamity occur, the issue would mainly depend. 

The harbour of Victoria is far from perfect, but is 
capable of vast improvement at small outlay ; besides, 
it almost joins Esquimalt Harbour, admitted to be the 
most perfect harbour on the coast. Hobson's Bay may 
be said to be the port of Melbourne, though separated 
from it by some miles. The waters of Esquimalt 
and Victoria Harbours are in one place only 600 yards 
apart ; and a line of railway to connect them would be 
half the length of the Melbourne and Hobson's Bay 
railway, which has been attended with such remark- 
able success. Eeference to diagram on Map II. will ex- 
plain at once this question of harbours. The main 
defect of Victoria Harbour is a sand bar from a to b, 
having on it eight or nine feet at lowest water. The 
basin of the harbour is deep enough for vessels drawing 
eighteen or twenty feet. Now if instead of connecting 
the harbours by a canal d, as has been proposed, the 
bridge at e were removed and the inlet embanked at c 
instead, which would be preferable as far as the road is 
concerned, and proper sluice-gates made in the em- 
bankment, the bar at the entrance being once dredged, 
the whole body of water from c to D might be used 
continually to scour the harbour out and act upon the 

cither of which commands the approach to New Westminster, should 
he declared not to belong to Great Britain, what purpose could be 
gained by erecting fortifications there ? 



H0PET0WJST, YALE, AND DOUGLAS. 55 

bar. If, in addition to this, the distance b a were 
slightly harrowed with sheet-piling, the improvement 
would be complete, and Victoria Harbour would be 
made one of the best harbours for merchantmen on the 
coast at a total expense not exceeding 5000/. or 6000/. 
The water on the bar of Fraser Eiver is about the 
same as on the bar of Victoria Harbour ; but in the first 
case a vessel has five miles of it to cross, in the latter 
say a few hundred yards.* 

Hopetown, at the head of steam navigation on the 
Fraser, is beautifully situated on the banks of the Que- 
quealla Eiver. The town site is a perfect one, and the 
variety and beauty of the surrounding scenery is such, 
that I could not attempt to describe it. The same 
remark might apply to Yale in a lesser degree. The 
latter looks wilder and less cultivated. 

These were originally the sites of Indian villages; 
not here alone, but invariably, the Indians on the coast 
have shown great sagacity in choosing, for their village 
sites, spots the most favoured by nature, commanding 
and accessible at the same time. Fresh water, fuel, and 
drainage are attended to ; facilities for boat navigation 
are never forgotten; and, whether we look at their 
camps, or from them, we quit them with the impression 
that the savage has a clear conception of, and knows 
how to appreciate, the picturesque and beautiful. 

* Further information on this subject will be found in the Ap- 
pendix, and in Parliamentary Papers relating to British Columbia, 
dated 1859, Part II. pp. 14, 19, and 60. 

If Victoria or Esquimalt, the head of sailing navigation within 
the straits, is not the natural site for the British Capital on the North 
Pacific, would it not be more reasonable to look for the desired 
locality on the western coast, at Barclay Sound, for instance, clear 
of the straits, than to run the gauntlet of tides and islands of the 
Gulf of Georgia ? 

e 4 



5<> ONE CAPITAL SUFFICIENT. 

Port Douglas is a promising town, but the site is very 
limited. The town consists at present of twenty small 
dwellings, a saw-mill, and a wharf. No doubt the 
several towns on Eraser Eiver will ultimately bear to 
Victoria the same relation that Stocton, Sacramento, 
and Mary's-ville now bear to San Francisco. 

The local government of California for a considerable 
time retarded the growth of San Francisco, by endea- 
vouring to make Benicia the capital. 

Victoria has many advantages over San Francisco. 
The cold gusts that constantly toward evening blow 
upon the latter from seaward, through the Golden Gate, 
as it were through a funnel, are far from agreeable, 
carrying with them, as they frequently do, clouds of 
exceedingly fine, penetrating sand. San Francisco is se- 
parated from the neighbouring agricultural country — 
from the beautiful valleys of Santa Clara and San Jose, 
by miles of sandy hillocks, hopelessly barren. There 
shaky titles retard improvement, and the administra- 
tion of justice is proverbially defective. To all this I 
need hardly add Victoria presents a bright contrast. 

As the country improves and population increases, 
Government will, of course, have occasion to lay out 
and dispose of many town sites. But there v is in this 
nothing to prevent the recognition of the principle — 
one capital for the British possessions on the Pacific, 
— or the announcement of the site of it, when finally 
fixed upon. 



T%9 | 12k 

Scott x? \ ] 



12b 



^tangle £a*vz Js 
Ca? e 



IMOTWIEiE IglLMfB 



AND 



©QDlLtF ©IF ©g@^©GA 

,y Tngiisli Miles. 



j> jo 20 



¥*!*!♦ 




E.Vfeller.IiQi. RedEion Square, London. 




AHS^,- 



57 



CHAP. V. 

INSTITUTION OF THE COLONIES OF VANCOUVER ISLAND AND BRITISH 

COLUMBIA. THEIR PROGRESS TRACED, AND COMPARED WITH THAT 

OF THE ADJOINING AMERICAN STATES. THEIR COMMERCE. POLICY 

OF ENGLAND AND AMERICA RESPECTIVELY, WITH REGARD TO THEIR 
POSSESSIONS ON THE PACIFIC. 

Has the progress of Her Majesty's Colonies in the 
North- West Pacific been commensurate with their 
natural geographical and commercial advantages, and 
with the resources of soils, minerals, timber, and 
fisheries which they are shown to possess, with a 
climate admitted to be better adapted to the constitu- 
tion of Englishmen than that of any other portion of 
the Western Hemisphere from Cape Horn to Aliaska ; 
and if not, why not ? — are questions which I shall now 
endeavour to answer to the satisfaction of the reader, 
and at the same time to show, by a production of facts, 
the present commercial status of these colonies, with 
reference to that of the American States adjoining. 

The first step taken by Great Britain to establish a 
colony on the north-west coast, omitting. at present the 
consideration of Eed Eiver Colony, as too far inland to 
promise early success, was in 1849, one year after the 
gold discoveries in California, when by a Crown grant 
the Hudson's Bay Company were entrusted with the 
colonisation of Vancouver Island. The provisions of the 
grant are too well known to require detailed insertion 
here ; but the principal inducements held out to immi- 
grants under it were as follows. 

1st. — That no grant of land should contain less than 
twenty acres. 



58 INSTITUTION OF THE COLONIES. 

2nd. — Purchasers of land to pay one pound per acre. 

3rd. — That purchasers of land provide a passage to 
Vancouver Island for themselves and their families, if 
they have any ; or be provided with a passage (if they 
prefer it) on paying for the same at a reasonable rate. 

4th. — That purchasers of larger quantities of land 
should pay the same price per acre, namely one pound, 
and should take out with them five single men, or three 
married couples, for every hundred acres. 

5th. — That all minerals, wherever found, should 
belong to the Company, who should have the right of 
digging for the same, compensation being made to the 
owner of the soil for any injury done to the surface ; 
but that the owner should have the privilege of working 
for his own benefit any coal mine that might be on his 
land, on payment of a royalty of half a crown per ton. 

6th. — That the right of fishing at first proposed to 
be given to the Hudson's Bay Company, having been 
relinquished, every freeholder should enjoy the right of 
fishing ; and that all the ports and harbours should be 
open and free to them, and to all nations either trading 
or seeking shelter therein. 

The circular from which the above is taken, then 
makes provision for the establishment of places of 
public worship, and the maintenance of ministers of 
religion, a policy afterwards abandoned ; and concludes 
with a proposal to form a colonial legislature combin- 
ing the usual elements of governor, council, and assem- 
bly, with powers to enact laws and enforce taxes. 

A programme so illiberal, so restrictive, and so de- 
trimental to the memory of the colonial administration 
of Earl Grey, for ten years stopped the settlement of 
the country. Ultimately the grant was revoked, and 
on the 1st June 1859, Vancouver Island colony fell 
directly under the management of the Crown, previous 



ALLEGED CAUSES OF NON-SETTLEMENT. 59 

to which date the exclusive right to trade from the 
Pacific to the Eocky Mountains, which the Hudson's 
Bay Company had before possessed, was withdrawn, 
and the colony of British Columbia instituted by the Act 
of August 2nd, 1858. 

The obstacles which I shall now enumerate have 
been repeatedly assigned and accredited by the Go- 
vernment, as having hitherto prevented the successful 
development of these colonies*: — 

1st, — the attraction of the gold region of Cahfornia; 
2nd, — the high rate of wages in the colony and terri- 
tories adjoining • preventing settlement ; 3rd, — the 
great distance from Great Britain, involving either a 
tadious voyage of five months and 17,000 miles, or 
the expense of the overland route by Panama or the 
plains ; 4th, — the high price of land ; 5th, — Duties 
averaging 24 per cent, levied on British goods in the 
neighbouring American ports. 

* u The high rate of wages in Oregon and California, and the 
attraction of the gold districts in the gold country, have not only 
operated to prevent persons of capital settling in Vancouver Island, 
but have also obstructed the Hudson's Bay Company, and the Puget 
Sound Company, in their endeavours to bring land into cultivation, 
and provide means of subsistence for settlers." — Governor of H. B. 
Company to Secretary of State for the Colonies, Nov. 24, 1852. 

" Its commerce, trammelled and met by restrictive duties on every 
side, its trade and resources remain undeveloped." — Governor of 
Vancouver Island's Address to Assembly, August 12, 1856. 

" Causes over which the local government had no control, and 
which are too well known to need recapitulation, have hitherto pre- 
vented the settlement from acquiring that development, which its 
founders may have expected." — Secretary of State for the Colonies^ 
to Governor of Vancouver Island, Feb. 28, 1856. 

See also index to Eeport of Select Committee on the Hudson's 
Bay Company, under heading, " Vancouver Island : Causes of Non- 
Settlement." " The distance from England, and the nearness of the 
Californian gold fields, have prevented the settlement and progress 
of the island." Also Blue Books on this subject, passim. 



60 THE REAL BAR TO SETTLEMENT STILL EXISTS. 

And since, with the exception of No. 4, these im- 
pediments, if such, continue to exist, it will be well to 
examine into them separately : and I think it can be shown 
that the colonies of North West America have not been 
retarded at all to the extent supposed by the combina- 
tion of causes alleged ; but that the real bar to their 
development still exists in their utter isolation and 
absence of connection with each other ; in which remark 
I include not Vancouver Island and British Columbia 
alone, but also Eed Kiver, and (why not ?) Sascatche- 
wan, all which should derive, from connection, with 
each other, the Canadas, and as a consequence with 
England, the same vitality, that Washington, Oregon, 
California, and the intervening states, derive from the 
chain of excellent communications by land that bind 
them to one another, and to the Eastern American 
States ; and in the case of Vancouver Island and 
British Columbia, in the want as well of main lines of 
internal communication and of other works of a pub- 
lic nature, indispensable to the success of the first 
arrivals : that from want of numbers it is impossible 
for these to procure by taxation the capital required to 
open up communications in a country so vast and wild, 
and endow it with the elements of success; but that if this 
capital were once obtained, and judiciously and honestly 
applied, success would attend the first adventurers, 
immigration on a large scale ensue, resulting in a pros- 
perous, and therefore taxable population, sufficiently 
numerous in a short time to pay the interest of what I 
may term their national debt, and ultimately to dis- 
charge the debt itself, and to add to the power and com- 
merce of England ; that the requisite capital could 
be procured, and the benefits stated conferred, without 
trenching, to any great extent, upon the revenues of 
Great Britain ; and I shall afterwards endeavour to in- 



OREGON STATE AND WASHINGTON TERRITORY. 61 

dicate the nature and extent of the works required for 
the purposes stated, and approximately the cost of them. 
I demur to the first impediment, by adducing the 
parallel instances of Oregon and Washington. These 
states, which are notoriously not gold-producing, al- 
though samples may be found there, as in Vancouver 
Island, are nearer to California than the British settle- 
ments are, therefore obstacles Nos. 1 and 2 have all along 
applied to them more forcibly than to the latter. 
Oregon and Washington were formed into a territory 
by Act of Congress, dated August 14, 1848, and Great 
Britain commenced her colonies in January, 1849, 
so it may be said the start was a fair one. As to com- 
parative natural advantages, even Americans admit the 
great superiority of those of the British settlements. 
Look at Oregon as its boundaries are now defined — 
in point of physical aspect, every part of the coast is 
dangerous to navigation on account of the heavy surf con- 
tinually beating against its shores ; . there is not a toler- 
able or accessible harbour in its whole length, its rivers 
are choked with sand-bars : hi point of agricultural 
advantages, it certainly has its rich valleys, much in the 
way that British Columbia has, from the sea to the 
cascades, 80 to 150 miles ; and within this tract is 
embraced the only valuable portion of the State. 
Within the valleys of the Willamette, Umqua, and Eogue 
Kivers, the farming population, and all the counties yet 
estabhshed, are concentrated. The tract from the 
Cascades to the Blue Mountains, will never be of use 
beyond some pastoral purposes, and from the Blue Moun- 
tains to the Eocky Mountains, has been justly charac- 
terised as wild, sterile, and impracticable ; mountain 
ranges and isolated buttes ; and unless in the imme- 
diate neighbourhood of the valleys of the rivers men- 



62 PROGRESS IN THE BRITISH COLONIES. 

tioned, the country is altogether too rugged for any 
industrial purpose. 

Of Washington Territory a more favourable account 
must be given : it has its inlets, canals, and islands, the 
latter often capable of the most profitable cultivation, 
but the whole tract of country within it capable of 
cultivation is very limited, included within the narrow 
strip of country extending from Admiralty Inlet to the 
Columbia, and hemmed in by the Cascade Mountains 
and the Olympic range : the great plain of the Columbia, 
occupying the main width of the territory, from the 
Cour d'Alene range to the outliers of the Cascades, is 
a hopeless desert, and, unless close to the river and its 
branches, utterly uninhabitable. 

And now to compare results. Vancouver Island 
colony was established ten years ago, and British Co- 
lumbia two ; in neither have we, as yet, any farming 
population worth mentioning. America feeds us ; 
America carries our letters to us ; we reach them by 
American steamers, or we travel by American routes ; 
the bulk of the merchandise we consume comes from 
American ports. In Vancouver Island, the rich valleys 
of Cowichan, Puntledge, and Barclay Sound are uncon- 
nected and by land unapproachable. I was sixteen days 
reaching Nitinat from Saanich.* Even between Esqui- 
malt Harbour and Victoria the capital, three miles, 
the road is execrable, and while a small expenditure 
would render Victoria Harbour one of the most com- 
modious on the coast for whalers or merchant vessels, 
it remains unlighted and unfrequented. The island 
is unimproved, progress being entirely limited to Vic- 
toria district and Victoria Town, and caused in the 
latter very exceptional cases, I believe, by its free port, 
and the effect beneficial to it of the restrictive duties 

* 60 or 70 miles. 



PROGRESS IN UNITED STATES ADJACENT. 63 

levied in American ports, as I shall afterwards have 
occasion to show. 

In British Columbia, with the exception of a few 
trails, the only attempt at opening a communication 
into the interior has been on the Harrison Eiver and 
Lilouette Eoute, forty-four miles by water and sixty-four 
miles by land. Miners are the only population, except 
the few traders that supply them : the gold finds its 
way to San Francisco, the miners winter there, and the 
surface gold — the principal inducement to labouring 
emigrants — threatens to be seriously diminished before 
a farming population is established in the country ; the 
export trade of these colonies is as yet too insignificant 
to be worth detailing. 

To complete the comparison, I shall now give the 
result of a state census of Oregon and Washington 
combined, taken in 1850. 

Number of dwellings ..... 2374 

Number of families ..... 2374 

Number of farms . . . . . .1164 

1 . /white . . . 13087 Washington . 1201 

ro P uiatlon t free coloured . 207 Oregon . .12093 



Total . . 13294 

By the census taken in 1855, the population of 
Oregon alone was estimated at 33,324, showing an 
increase of nearly 176 per cent, in three years, and 
had at the same time fifty manufacturing establish- 
ments at work. 

By a census taken in 1856, the population of Wash- 
ington territory was 5500, and the following statement of 
the exports of last year shows that their commerce kept 
pace with their population, and that notwithstanding 
its greater distance from San Francisco, Puget Sound has 
nearly usurped the trade that formerly belonged to 
Humboldt Bay, Umqua, and Trinidad. 



64 



COMMERCE OF PUGET SOUND. 





£ 


B s ! 1 ; : 1 1 i I : i 






■a 








> 


,§ "■• I : : i i i i j i ? 


©, 




s 

ho 


©:::::::::: 


© 
















ft. 










U 


e § i i i i 1 ! ! 1 1 ! 


1 © 

© 




1 
1 


£ 


3-s-i jf.mnM 


m" 






1 o ::•:::::: : 


.-> 
















* 


°- : : : : \ : : : : : 
1 « ::::::::: : 


1© 


































% 


> 


1,3 co" : J ::::::: : 


CO 




o 










s 


















% 


s 


:::::::::: 


















■* 






p< 














































Q 


o 


i> ::::::::: : 










°* ::::::::: : 


ai 






3 


» 


: ;©©— 'io©©— i©© 


CO 
04 








; .•i^ocooaivi^-ooci^- 














CO 




a. 


>■ 


■a 






























: • o oo ffi c<n^ m ai v n 


00 


















fc 






~ 
















© 








ic : o o : 




. © © 
























a 












t^ 






2 00 ; © !N J 














> 




30 Ol 








t* 




•§ ©" : -J" ; 




- 1 




© 




«f£ 




o : c © ? 




KI © 




,n 




















































m ; © >o : 












£ 


(M . «5 .1 • 








oo 








































""" : : 








" H 


















ai .— • ^r © i> m r~ ai © © 


CO 






3 










,i io .otxmHTfOMOf 


<M 




"8 


£ 
















,2 of : zs n to -<f x *x •<£ >a 

^ © ;coco r-. TT — . 
















<M 












§ 




© JiOiM © Ol T 3> © 








iO .OOMMCJKr^TNTr 














kJ 




ai ;©icoo-tf©t^.r- © 








CO . r— : ro ^r Oi — O! © © — ■ 








io ! <D 51 CO ■— i © IM © io 




















CO • CI •— — CO — > 


lO 


















IS 
































a 








C? : : : : 








.§ 
















S 


o 




^ 


M ) ? : : 








a 


3 

B 




.2a = « : 
«.S j- : 5 : 


ci •" o • • 
ps.2 : • 




i 

J 






i^acBoc" — — Tr 




"< 
h 











r^.w©fOiooi>o— im©o 

oj_Tj.(r>a>>c<M— . — c-j© 

«ff) VOO-MCC-nTMCO 



3 : : : 

« : : { 

- = £ : % 

2 O a> tX) 



3 g.3.3 






THE LUMBER TRADE OF THE PACIFIC. 



65 



Exports of Lumber from California. 





FROM HUMBOLDT BAT. 




To Melbourne 


. 


. 600,000 


To Honolulu 


FROM SAN FRANCISCO. 


. 100,000 






To Australia 




. 1,136,923 


To Peru . 




. 821,497 


To Mexico . 




. 540,236 


To Sandwich Islands 




. 106,540 


To Victoria, V.I. 




. 287,206 


To other Countries 




. 1,742,994 


Total feet 





700,000 



4,635,396 
5,335,396 



As to the second allegation, it will be at once ad- 
mitted that the rate paid for labour of different kinds 
in San Francisco and California, regulates equally the 
labour markets of Oregon, Washington, and the British 
possessions ; a high rate of wages is the principal in- 
ducement to the largest and most useful class of emi- 
grants ; far from being an impediment to settlement, 
the cause assigned ought to produce in these colonies 
the most beneficial effects. 

From the foregoing I deduce that we must look 
for some other agency than those stated in No. 1 and 
No. 2, for the want of success complained of. 



Before passing to the consideration of Allegation 
No. 3, I shall here shortly detail the nature and 
extent of the trade of the British colonies with San 
Francisco, so as to give this branch of the subject a 
connected form. 

The Pacific Mail Steam Company run steamers once 
a fortnight both ways, between Victoria and San Fran- 



66 EXPORTS. 

cisco, carrying passengers at $50 a head, and freight 
$20 per ton. Sixty-three vessels, representing a tonnage 
of 52,508, also cleared at San Francisco within the 
last year, carrying freight to the island at $3 to $4, and 
passengers at $25 to $30 : the vessels are for the most 
part American. 

Our exports consisted of gold in 1859, to the value 
of $2,000,000, as under that head was shown ; which 
export in 1858 was estimated at $1,500,000. 

Coal (perhaps) 2000 tons, in 1858 it was 1755 tons. 
Oregon and Washington export about 200 tons a month, 
and the whole amount of coal imported into San Fran- 
cisco from the coast north of it in 1859, was 4772 tons. 

In addition to the above, we may have exported 
a small quantity of fish and oil, and a few barrels of 
cranberries, and here we must stop. The spars sent to 
England in 1859, had to be procured on the American 
side ; as, although our timber is just the same and ports 
to ship it from better, no business of the kind had up 
to that time been established either on the island or 
the mainland.* I omit furs altogether from the con- 
sideration of exports, affording no criterion of colonial 
wealth or of colonial improvement, but rather the 
reverse. 

Next, as to our imports in 1859. The gold above 
mentioned was spent principally in San Francisco in 
the purchase of the list of goods annexed. 

{from San Francisco . . . $1,199,380 

„ Puget Sound . . . 192,539 

„ Elsewhere . . . 108,081 



$1,500,000 

* Some enterprising London merchants have recently established, 
under very able management, a business of this description at the 
head of Barclay Sound. 



IMPORTS. 



67 



In addition to this, the Hudson's Bay Company 
imported some few cargoes of English goods, princi- 
pally for their own trade, and which constituted the 
only shipments of consequence from England. 



LIST OF GOODS SHIPPED FROM SAN FRANCISCO TO VICTORIA, V. I. 
AND BRITISH COLUMBIA IN 1859. 



Absynthe, cs. . 






. 72 


Corn, sks. 


. 98 


Agricultural implements, pes. . 32 


Corn meal, puns. 


4 


Alcohol, bbls 136 


do. bbls. 


. 40 


do. cs. . 






. 172 


do. sks. 


. 381 


Anchors, no. . 






. 56 


Coffee, bags 


. 544 


Bacon, hhds. . 






. 225 


do. cs. 


. 360 


do. cs. 






. 447 


Cordage, coils, 


. 251 


do. pkgs. 






. 554 


do. pkgs. 


. 95 


Barley, bags 






16,937 


Cheese, bxs. . 


. 95 


Beans, bags 






11,065 


do. pkgs. . 


. 118 


Beef, bbls. 






. 99 


China goods, pkgs. . 


1613 


do. cs. . 






21 


Chocolate, cs. . 


. 26 


Beer, csks. 






. 858 


Clothing, pkgs. 


. 666 


do. kegs 






. 11 


Clocks, pkgs. . 


. 3 


do. cs. . 






. 101 


Crockery, csks. ? 


9 


Bitters, cs. 






. 122 


do. pkgs. 


. 35 


Boilers, no. 






2 


Drugs, pkgs. . 


. 904 


Boots and shoes, pkg 


s. 


1321 


Dry goods, pkgs. 


1633 


Buckwheat, bags 




3 


Fancy goods, pkgs. 


4 


Butter, firkins . 




1028 


Fire crackers, bxs. . 


. 450 


Building materials — 






Fish, drums 


. 19 


Lumber, feet 




287,206 


do. bbls. 


. 6 


do. pes. 




. 131 


do. kits 


. 140 


Blinds, bdl. . 




1 


do. bxs. . 


. 28 


Doors, bdls. and n 


0. 


. 748 


Flour, bbls. 


2654 


Sash, bdls. and no 




. 369 


do. hf. sks. . 


4620 


Pickets, bdl. . 




1 


do. qr. sks. . 


39,761 


Bran, bags 




2473 


Fruit, green and dried, bb 


Is. . 145 


Brandy, hhds. . 




. 13 


do. bxs. do. 


. 481 


do. \ pipes 
do. \ pipes 




3 


do. pkgs. do. 


. 64 




. 27 


Furniture, pkgs. 


1136 


do. octaves 




. 442 


Gin, pipes and puns. 


. 57 


do. cs. 




. 45 


do. bbls. 


9 


Bread, bbls. 






. 477 


do. kegs 


. 2 


do. cs. 






. 767 


do. cs. 


. 248 


do. pkgs. 






. 473 


Glass, bxs. 


. 168 


Bricks, M. 






. 203 


Glassware, pkgs. 


. 131 


Brooms, doz. 






. 179 


Groceries, pkg<. 


2567 


Camphene, cs. 






. 857 


Guns, cs. 


4 


Candles, bxs. 






2920 


Gunnies, bdls. 


. 104 


Carts, no. 






6 


do. bales 


- 48 


Cement, bbls. 






. 148 


Hams, casks 


. 15 


Cider, bbls. 






. 139 


do. bbls. 


. 260 


do. cs. 






. 491 


do. pkgs. , 


. 33 


Cigars, cs. 






. 157 


Hardware, pkgs 


2250 


Coal, csks. 




4 


Hay, bales 


2911 


Copper, cs. , 






2 


Hollow-ware, pkgs. . 


. 10 



F 2 



68 



IMPORTS ANALYSED. 



Hollow- ware, pes. . 




. 56 


Rice, mats 


10 


Hops, cs. and bales . 




. 23 


do. csks. 




Iron pipe, pes. 




. 200 


Rum, puns. 




Lard, bbls. 




6 


do. bbls. 




do. cs. . . . 




. 397 


do. keg 




Leather, rolls . 




. 21 


Saddlery, pkgs. 




Lead, white, kegs 




. 172 


Safes, iron, no. 




Lime, bbls. 




. 423 


Salt, sks. . 




Liqueurs, cs. . 




. 104 


do. bbls. 




Liquors, unspecified, octaves 


. 59 


do. bxs. 




do. do. bbls. 


. 71 


Sardines, cs. 




do. do. kegs 


. 250 


Saw mills, no. . 




do. do. cs. 


. 400 


Ship chandlery, pkgs. 




do. do. pkgs. 


. 248' 


Shot, bags 




Maccaroni, bxs. 


. 132 


do. kegs 




Machinery, pes. and pkgs. 




. 393 


Soap, bxs. 


; 


Malt, sks. 




. 386 


Spices, cs. 




Matches, cs. 




. 103 


do. pkgs. 




Matting, rolls . 




. 62 


Spirits turpentine, cs. 




Merchandise, pkgs. . 




1017 


Starch, bxs. 




Metals, bars 




. 600 


Stationery, pkgs. 




do. cs. and bdls. 




. 409 


Steel, pkgs. 




Molasses and syrups, bbls 




. 15 


Stoves, no. and pkgs. 




do. kegs . 




1252 


Sugar, mats 


s 


do. cs. . 




. 153 


do. bbls. 




Nails, kegs 




. 751 


do. bxs. and cs. . 




Nuts, pkgs. 




. 37 


do. pkgs. . 




Oats, bags 




1416 


Tar, bbls. 




Oakum, bales . 




. 96 


Teas, pkgs. 




Oars, no. . 




. 442 


Tin, plate, bxs. 




do. pkgs. 




. 38 


Tin ware, pkgs. 




Oil, bbls. . 




. 65 


Tobacco, bales 




do cs. . 




. 176 


do. cs. and bxs. 




do. pkgs. 




. 31 


Tools, pkgs. 




Paints, pkgs. . 




. 937 


Trunks, no. 




Paper, pkgs. . 




. 97 


Tubs, nests 




Pianos, no. 




. 7 


Twine, pkgs. . 




Pickles, preserves, &c. 




1484 


Vinegar, bbls. . 




do. kegs . 




. 350 


do. kegs . 




do. pkgs. . 




. 29 


Waggons, no. . 




Pipes, cs. . 




. 95 


Wheat, bags . 




Pitch, bbls. 




. 38 


Whisky, puns. 




Piaster, bbls. . 




. 90 


do. cs. . 




Pork, bbls. 




. 316 


do. bbls. . 




Potatoes, bags 




. 394 


do. kegs . 




Towder, kegs . 




. 34 


Wine, pipes 




do. bxs. . 




. 23 


do. csks. 




Printing materials, pkgs 




7 


do. bbls. 




Provisions, unspecified, pkgs. 


. 174 


do. kegs. 




Pumps, no. . . , 


. 11 


do. cs. 


1 


Pure spirits, pipes . 


. 12 


do. bskts. . 




do. bbls 


9 


Yeast powders, cs. . 




Quicksilver, flasks . 




. 19 


Zinc, rolls. 





A close examination of this list will throw a flood of 
light on the present condition of the colonies. In the 
first place the total amount is astonishingly large, nearly 



EXPORTS OF SAN FRANCISCO. 



69 



equal in value to that of the entire export of the staple 
commodities of San Francisco, such as hides, horns, oil, 
wool, &c. to New York, and far exceeding the exports 
of San Francisco to any other port. 

The annexed table, showing the aggregate value of 
the exports of San Francisco, and among what countries 
distributed, for the past four years, according to returns 
made to the custom-house, will corroborate the state- 
ments last made. 



To 



New York .... 
Australia .... 

Mexico 

Peru 

Great Britain . . . 

France 

Sandwich Islands . 
China . . . . . 
Russia in America . 
Russia in Asia . . 

Chile 

Society Islands . . 
New Grenada . . 
Ports in Pacific . . 
Johnson's Island . . 
Vancouver Island . 
Costa Rica . . . 
East Indies . . . 
Batavia ..... 
Nicaragua .... 
San Salvador . . . 

Manilla 

Japan 

Guam (Ladrone) Isl's 



Total 



1859. 
dollars. 
,418,100 
730,427 
682,490 
156,616 

29,100 

7,000 

358,538 

252,061 

15,640 

55,505 
347,034 

52,606 

205,952 

2,155 

1,147 

,199,380 

13,779 

1,455 



3,912 
514 



5,533,411 



1858. 
dollars. 

1,284,000 
380,099 
702,112 
137,872 



273,535 

224,568 

3,875 

53,174 

150,495 

54,523 

46,617 



1,413,221 

38,025 

278 

6,779 

797 



10,193 



4,780,163 



1857. 
dollars. 

2,158,000 
314,604 
744,055 
139,700 



295,200 
313,896 
36,545 
68,607 
157,698 
51,576 
40,000 



30,149 
2,999 

2,500 

7,086 
7,143 



4,369,758 



1856. 
dollars. 

1,113,500 
1,123,367 

781,059 
337,693 



249,303 
239,942 
127,911 

116,787 
61,819 
43,126 
35,453 

23,376 

12,000 

2,750 

2,430 



4,270,516 



Examining the goods' list in detail, we find that it 
includes every kind of agricultural produce, not even to 
the exclusion of hay. Freights are high on the coast, 
and hay is bulky and liable to heat and set fire to the 
ship. Notwithstanding all this, in winter when hay is 
indispensable at Victoria,- and sells at prices ranging 

p 3 



70 SAN FRANCISCO PRICES. 

from SI. to 16/. per ton, Calif ornian hay is the only hay- 
in the market, a fact exceedingly encouraging to intend- 
ing emigrant farmers from this country. The list in- 
cludes every kind of building material, lumber, bricks, 
&c. At the close of 1859 there was but one saw-mill at 
work, or I believe, in existence, and not a single brick- 
making machine in the island. The bulk of the lumber 
we consume is supplied from Puget Sound, as seen by 
a former tabular statement. 

While on this subject I would mention, the retail 
price of anything in San Francisco is about four times 
as much as it would be in London ; and although 
cargoes frequently arrive there to find an overstocked 
market, and are sold at a loss to the owners at auction 
or otherwise, still these retail prices vary but little from 
time to time. In Victoria retail prices are generally 
15 per cent, higher than in San Francisco. The 
Hudson's Bay Company sell lower considerably, but 
generally send a stock of goods unsuited to the market, 
selected, as they are, for a special purpose. 



Passing on to Allegation No. 3, let us inquire to what 
extent distance from England retards the settlement of 
these colonies, and whether this is an element so 
damaging that it cannot be overcome. 

The Atlantic can now be crossed at an expense, 
ranging from 21. 10s. upwards, and for that small sum 
the British emigrant can be carried to the eastern 
coast of the American continent. If, therefore, a road 
to the British colonies on the western coast were 
constructed, emigrants from Great Britain and from 
the United States would, with the exception of that 
small difference, be on an equality with respect to the 
expense of locomotion. 



DISTANCE FROM ENGLAND. 71 

The American territories south of the British are 
principally peopled via San Francisco, where 30,000 
to 40,000 people arrive within the year, and we have 
the evidence of Mr Horace Greely* and others, that the 
great mass of this increase of population comes from the 
Atlantic slope direct, and that these territories are not 
progressively populated. The passenger statistics of the 
port of San Francisco and of the overland routes cor- 
roborate this statement ; and it may safely be asserted, 
that three out of four arrivals at San Francisco have 
either crossed the continent or the isthmus. But, in 
addition to a route by which the colonies can be 
reached, internal communications are indispensable to 
the success of the emigrant ; for instance, the difficulty 
of transport only was removed, in the case of emigrants 
sent by the Hudson's Bay Company to Vancouver 
Island, the majority of whom took leave of .the British 
settlements shortly after their arrival, and found oc- 
cupation on American farms, or work in American 
mills. 

The difficulty of transport only was also removed in 
the case of hosts of deserters, Irish, Germans, and others 
from the American army of the west, whose interests 
would have led them, if possible, to settle out of their own 
country, in Vancouver Island or in British Columbia, 

* "Of course these (the annual increase) were not all from the 
Atlantic slope, via the Isthmus or Nicaragua ; but the great mass of 
them were." — Overland Journey to California, 1859, p. 369. 

In 1859, arrivals at San Francisco by sea were . . . 38,183 
Departure ....... 24,781 



13,402 
By various overland routes .... 25,000 



Addition to the population .... 38,402 
f 4 



72 LANDED INTEREST. 

on the same principle as our deserted seamen settle in 
American territory ; but I cannot call to mind a single 
instance of their having done so. 

In 1 8 5 8 and 1 8 5 9 , a considerable number of Canadians, 
after suffering great hardships by coming by the over- 
land trails, to my own knowledge went back discouraged. 
These men had spent all the money they had, in tra- 
velling to the island via Eed Eiver : their intention was 
to farm, which, without some capital to commence 
with, is not remunerative — had they been labourers 
they would no doubt have remained, as it was, they 
returned impoverished and exhausted. 

From the considerations above stated, it may be 
gathered that until these colonies are traversed by a 
main road, and internal communications established, 
even if carried there free of expense, emigrants may 
still find it more profitable to settle elsewhere. 



That the price of land has hitherto been too high in 
these colonies, particularly when America was in many 
places " donating " contiguous lands, and that the pre- 
emptive law, recently promulgated in British Columbia, 
will have the best effects, I am fully prepared to admit. 

And while regarding this as the best measure up 
to the time of a governor of acknowledged ability, 
and hoping that its benefits will soon be extended 
to the island, I cannot believe that it is alone sufficient 
to relieve these colonies from the stagnation under 
which they suffer. 

For the last five years, land, although too dear, 
has not been oppressively so on the island. To be 
sure the nominal price was 1/. per acre ; but a liberal 
allowance for rock and swamp, payment by instal- 



SPECULATORS IN LANDS. 73 

ments, allowing an interval of two years to elapse 
before the payment of the second, greatly modified those 
terms to the advantage of the early settler ; still the 
country lands continued unoccupied ; but in addition 
to this, in 1852 and 1853 the governor tried to es- 
tablish frontier villages, offering free grants of twenty 
acres to persons of his own selection, with no other 
restriction than the stipulation of receiving their com- 
bined services in the event of Indian disturbances in 
the neighbourhood, which there was then some reason 
to apprehend — but without success. The fact is, in 
these, as in every other new colony, speculators in 
land are a class who clamour against and assail, under 
the cloak of advocating liberal measures, every act of 
Government which has not a tendency to place the 
lands of the colony in their hands in anticipation of 
settlement ; and attacks on Government on this head 
should be examined into with caution and even with 
mistrust. The settlers in the new American states, 
not satisfied with a very liberal preemptive law, ask to 
have the land for nothing. The Secretary of the 
Interior, in his annual reports of 1859, alludes to the 
expectation in the pubhc mind that Congress would 
pass a law making a "gratuitous distribution of the 
pubhc domain : " and again, " should, however, the 
new policy of a gratuitous distribution of the pubhc 
lands be adopted," &c, which is enough to show that 
whatever enactments on this subject are made, land 
grievances will still continue. 

Again, where skilled labourers can earn 300Z. a 
year, and common labourers 150/., it is impossible 
that hs. to 10s. an acre, the price at which lands have 
been hitherto offered, can have been the bar to their 
settlement ; fully admitting at the same time as I do, 



74 PRICE OF LAND. 

the sound policy, but not the absolute necessity, of 
making this first tax on the settler as moderate as 
possible. 

Again, at the prices first named, the cost of fencing 
a piece of land is much greater than the price of it ; 
the oxen and plough required to break it up will be 
worth more than a hundred acre section ; and on going 
in this way further into particulars, we at length find 
that the price of land is but an item, and a compara- 
tively small one, in farming expenditure ; and yet it 
is not contended that the other and greater items 
alluded to prevent the settlement and development of 
a country. 



The last allegation (JSTo. 5) touches reciprocity. 

I do not meddle with the question, Whether free 
trade between the British and Americans on the west 
coast, would or would not benefit either or both, but 
merely undertake to show that the want of it has 
not been as yet influential in retarding the former. 

The following consideration ought not to be lost sight 
of; the extravagant prices of American merchandise 
of every description on the coast is attributable, in 
some measure, to their exorbitant port dues, but 
mainly to the 24 per cent, tariff which of course 
prevents American merchants from procuring their 
goods in the cheapest markets. 

Suppose Victoria with its free port once to become 
the depot of British merchandise. She must command 
the retail market of the entire Sound and British 
Columbia, and undersell the Americans in the Eussian 
settlements and Sandwich Islands, to say nothing of 
the opposite Asiatic coast. 



RECIPEOCITY. 75 

Hitherto, as before explained, Victoria has had no 
trade worth mentioning with England ; her wants were 
supplied from San Francisco, and ruled by San Francisco 
prices ; the desired result has not yet taken place. 

If we had had a surplus of agricultural produce, 
lumber, wool, fish, &c, there was nothing to prevent 
our sending it, as San Francisco has done, to the 
Eussian settlements, South America, Australia, Sand- 
wich Islands, China, and even Japan. "Why complain 
of the want of a market for goods of which we are 
consumers only, and not producers? After the com- 
munication to and within the colonies shall have been 
established, and commerce with England result from 
population, the Americans themselves will be the first 
to find the disadvantage of their restrictive duties in 
competing with us at the more distant markets.* 

* Extract from the Government Address on opening the General 
Assembly at Victoria, August 12, 1856 : — 

a Gentlemen, I am happy to inform you that Her Majesty's Govern- 
ment continue to express the most lively interest in the progress and 
welfare of this colony. 

" Negotiations are now pending with the Government of the United 
States, which may probably terminate in an extension of the reci- 
procity treaty to Vancouver Island. 

" To show the commercial advantages connected with that treaty, I 
will just mention that an import duty of SOL is levied on every 
lOOZ.'s worth of British produce which is now sent to San Francisco, 
or to any other American port ; or, in other words, the British pro- 
prietor pays as a tax to the United States, nearly the value of every 
third cargo of fish, timber, or coal, which he sends to any American 
port. The reciprocity treaty utterly abolishes those fearful imposts, 
and establishes a system of free trade in the produce of British 
colonies. 

" The effects of that measure, in developing the trade and natural 
resources of the colony, can, therefore, hardly be over-estimated. 

" The coal, the timber, and the productive fisheries of Vancouver 
Island, will assume a value before unknown ; while every branch of 



76 KECIPROCITY. 

It was an admitted maxim of the customs' depart- 
ment in England that when an import duty exceeded 
30 per cent., to prevent smuggling was impossible. If 
this was true in England, with a fleet of revenue cut- 
ters, and picketed with coast guards, how much more 
forcibly will the argument apply to the frontier that 
separates the British colonies from America, exposed 
and extended as that frontier is! As soon as we 
commence to undersell our neighbours, we shall supply 
them independently of tariffs. 

I do not say that a removal of those duties would 
not benefit both, but merely that our neighbours will 
first have cause on that score to complain. 

At a public meeting of the inhabitants of Minnesota 
at St. Paul's (July 10th, 1858), the following reso- 
lution was passed : — " That the people of Minnesota 
will join heartily with the people of Canada in the policy 
of colonising the western districts of British America, 
which is about to be established ; and that relations 
of reciprocal trade with the United States, if not now 
existing, should be extended over that region of North 
America." 

trade will start into activity, and become the means of pouring 
wealth into the country. 

" So unbounded is the reliance which I place in the enterprise and 
intelligence possessed by the people of this colony, and in the ad- 
vantages of their geographical position, that, with equal rights and a 
fair field, I think they may enter into successful competition with 
the people of any other country. 

" The extension of the reciprocity treaty to this island once gained, 
the interests of the colony will become inseparably connected with 
the principles of free trade, a system which, I think, it will be sound 
policy on our part to encourage." 

It is hardly necessary to say, the proposed measure did notta 
effect. 



RECIPROCITY. 77 

I doubt if an exception can be raised even in the 
matter of coals. The greatest portion by far of the 
coals consumed in San Francisco is English, and they 
also consume for domestic purposes as much Vancouver 
Island as Oregon coal. The observations previously 
made on this head show that the prospects of finding 
coal, suitable for steam purposes, hi Vancouver Island 
are much more promising than in Oregon. At present 
say San Francisco pays hi. a ton for English coal, while 
Nanaimo coal is sold at 1Z., and adding $3 to $4 freight, 
and 24 per cent, duty on the cost of production, Nanaimo 
coal will still be the cheapest in the market ; and we 
see a certainty of sale for all the coal suitable for 
steam purposes that Vancouver Island or British Co- 
lumbia can produce * : and how great the consumption 
is, may be conjectured from the fact, that a year ago 
the aggregate tonnage of San Francisco steamers ex- 
ceeded 35,000 tons, a figure which must since then 
have materially increased. 

The greatest anomaly under this head existing is, 
that British Columbia should impose 10 per cent, duties 
on the produce imported from Vancouver Island ; for 
although many articles are exempt from this regula- 
tion,- it applies to the supplies which the miners prin- 
cipally require ; such as flour, beans, salt meat, &c, — 
a source of revenue for which it is probable a direct 
tax on gold exported will ultimately be substituted. 

From the enumeration and discussion of alleged 
causes of non-settlement of these colonies, I have 
omitted altogether one that has been occasionally as- 

* This view is in fact confirmed by a letter received lately from the 
island, mentioning that the tonnage carrying coal from Nanaimo in 
the month of January last had increased, to 2000. The price of 
Nanaimo coal at the pit's mouth varies from $4 to $6. 



78 POLICY OF GREAT BRITAIN AND U. STATES COMPARED. 

signed, viz. that the Hudson's Bay Company used their 
influence systematically and intentionally to discourage 
and retard settlement in the country, because I thought 
it useless to enter upon or refute a charge which has not 
been accredited, by any unprejudiced person familiar 
with the facts, although my intimate acquaintance with 
the subject, and absence of all connection with the Com- 
pany, would fully enable me to do so. Underselling 
merchants of less capital, by whom they are surrounded, 
is a very unpopular avocation, and whether they do so 
in Oregon or the colonies, it will have the same effect, 
a chorus of denunciation will attend them wherever 
they trade. 

Having disposed of our first inquiries, we are here 
naturally led. to ask why is it that America has suc- 
ceeded so well with her colonies in the north-west, 
where England has comparatively, I might almost say 
signally, failed? The cause is, on examination, suffi- 
ciently obvious. Each nation asserts and acts upon a 
policy towards its colonies there, diametrically opposite 
to that of the other. 

England proposes to the first emigrant, land to oc- 
cupy with free institutions, and leaves it optional to 
them to establish for their own benefit, s and that of 
their successors, all leading communications, execution of 
survey, public works, and postal arrangements, or to omit 
to do so if they feel unwilling or unequal to the task. 

America, on the contrary, insists on the execution of 
those works of magnitude which she considers essential 
to begin with, holding the lands and the revenues 
derivable from customs and posts, until fully indemni- 
fied for the outlay incurred. 

To show that this case is correctly stated, I shall first 
quote from the despatches of Sir Edward Bulwer 



POLICY OF GREAT BRITAIN. 79 

Lytton the principle on which the colony of British 
Columbia was founded, and which, I may add, has 
been as strictly as possible adhered to, up to the 
present time. 

" October 29th, 1858.— Now as the Mother Country 
expects all colonies, not conquered nor founded for 
purely imperial purposes, to be self-supporting, &c.," 
and again, "Dec. 30th, 1858. — I cannot avoid remind- 
ing you, that the lavish pecuniary expenditure of the 
Mother Country in founding new colonies has been 
generally found to discourage economy, by leading the 
minds of men to rely on foreign aid instead of then- 
own exertions ; to interfere with the healthy action by 
which a new community provides step by step for its 
own requirements ; and to produce at last a general 
sense of discouragement and dissatisfaction. For a 
colony to thrive and develope itself with steadfast and 
healthful progress, it should from the first be as far as 
possible self-supporting. 

" No doubt it might be more agreeable to the pride 
of the first founders of a colony which promises to. 
become so important, if we could at once throw up 
public buildings, and institute establishments on a scale 
adapted to the prospective grandeur of the infant 
settlement. But after all, it is on the character of the 
inhabitants that we must rest our hopes for the land 
we redeem from the wilderness ; and it is by self- 
exertion, and the noble spirit of self-sacrifice which self- 
exertion engenders, that communities advance through 
rough beginnings to permanent greatness. Therefore 
it is not merely for the sake of sparing the Mother 
Country that I invite your cordial and intelligent co- 
operation in stimulating the pride of the colonists to 
submit to some necessary privations in the first instance, 



80 POLICY OF GREAT BRITAIN. 

and to contribute liberally and voluntarily from their 
own earnings (which appear to be so considerable), 
rather than to lean upon the British Parliament for 
grants, or for loans, which are rarely repaid without dis- 
content, and can never be cancelled without some loss 
of probity and honour. It is my hope that when the 
time arrives for representative institutions, the colony 
may be committed to that grand experiment unem- 
barrassed by a shilling of debt, and the colonists have 
proved their fitness for self-government by the spirit of 
independence which shrinks from extraneous aid, and 
schools a community to endure the sacrifices by which 
it guards its own safety and provides for its own 
wants," &c. 

Eloquent as the despatch from which the foregoing 
is extracted is, and matchless as a piece of literary 
composition, I cannot avoid thinking that the principles 
laid down in it might with advantage be re-considered. 
If, as Adam Smith says, the same reasoning may, in 
cases of this kind, be applied to communities as to in- 
dividuals, it would be equally impolitic for an indi- 
vidual to borrow money at interest, on the security of 
a large landed estate, for its improvement ; repayment 
of such a loan would occasion discontent r and, if the 
lender should propose to cancel the bond and with it 
the debt, the borrower would experience a certain 
twinge of moral degradation. Colonial infancy is 
ignored : the chrysalis must fly at once. Placed in the 
heart of a country of great promise and capabilities, but 
at present inaccessible and uninhabited, the reader, 
if he were to commence as a farmer or merchant, 
would, in this view, succeed better without roads to 
travel or traffic upon, or postal communications to 
distract ; and the habit of self-reliance tlms engendered, 



. POLICY OF GREAT BRITAIN". 81 

would be more valuable to him, far, than the profit of 
capital, however judiciously expended. 

On the other hand it may be possible, that if a tract of 
country is adapted by nature for early settlement, its 
lands, and the revenues derivable from the population, 
which, with reasonable facihties and access, its resources 
may, within the first year or two, attract and enrich, may 
afford ample security for the capital required to develope 
and place those resources within the reach of the immi- 
grants intended : that otherwise such a country is not fit 
for early settlement, and the attempt ought not to be 
made ; and that when a country is, in the opinion of our 
wisest statesmen, thus eligible, imperial and colonial in- 
terests being so intimately blended as they are, it may in 
certain cases be to the interest of England to encourage 
the expenditure of, and in some instances even to pro- 
vide, the capital required to make the country habitable, 
or at least accessible, and to control that expenditure, 
the debt being a charge against the lands and revenues 
of the country generally, recollecting that when the 
time should arrive, proper in the opinion of England, to 
grant free institutions to the inhabitants (which when 
granted in advance of population, tend merely to benefit 
some party or clique), it is unreasonable to suppose 
that a colony of Englishmen would then object to accept 
with them their just responsibilities, or desire to repu- 
diate advances made for their benefit if judiciously and 
honestly expended. 

Many public works, of the greatest utility, however, 
carry with them the capability of defraying, when ex- 
ecuted, their own expenditure, a principle that should 
be taken advantage of wherever it exists, of which a 
detailed histance is given in Chap. VII., in speaking of a 
proposed British emigrant route to the Pacific. 

G 



82 POLICY OF UNITED STATES. 

Public opinion on this subject in America, as we 
may gather from the President's last message, which 
may generally be regarded as an echo of the popular 
voice, is widely different from the policy above described. 
In speaking of the financial condition of the country, he 
says, " We ought never to forget that true public eco- 
nomy consists, not in withholding the means necessary 
to accomplish important national objects confided to us 
by the constitution, but in taking care that the money 
appropriated for these purposes, shall be faitlrfully and 
frugally expended." In practice, these maxims are 
usually effectuated as follows : — 

In the States, until the population of a territory 
is sufficient to justify its admission -into the Union, a 
government is provided for it by the parent state. 
The President, with the concurrence of the Senate, 
appoints all the principal officers, under whose direc- 
tion the roads at first most required are made, customs 
and postal arrangements established, the necessary 
public buildings erected — even lunatic asylums and 
libraries are not forgotten* — at the sole expense of the 
Federal Government. A local legislature is formed 
with limited powers to tax, the application of the 
proceeds being controlled by the officers of the Federal 
Government, which is kept well informed by a delegate 
to Congress, who is allowed to speak in the House of 
Eepresentatives, but not to vote. The Federal Govern- 
ment usually cedes to the territory some small tracts 
of wild land to practise upon, under certain restrictions 
as to sale. When the territory is admitted into the 

* It is said that Iowa for a considerable time after her population 
was sufficient to secure her admission as a state into the Union, 
evaded the distinction so as to reap the full benefit of immaturity. 



. POLICY OF UNITED STATES. 83 

Union as a state these grants are increased in all to 
500,000 acres for internal improvements, but even 
then the Federal Government continues to retain the 
principal appointments and reimburses itself for the 
previous outlay by continuing to receive the proceeds 
of customs, post office, and land sales, in the latter 
case less ten per cent, per annum of the net proceeds 
or balance which remains after paying the civil lists, 
which percentage or balance becomes the property of 
the state. 

The system appears in many respects inferior to our 
own, especially as many of the principal officers are 
liable to be removed by a change of the ministry at 
Washington, but it has this advantage in a remarkable 
degree, that by rapidly opening up communications 
and removing the most formidable impediments to the 
first settlers, a sudden impetus is given to emigration, 
the wilderness is quickly converted into a territory, 
and the territory into a state. 



G 2 



84 



CHAP. VI. 

ROUTES TO THE PACIFIC. BY LONG SEA. BY ROYAL MAIL LINE, OR 

Vld NEW YORK, ACROSS THE ISTHMUS OF PANAMA, TO SAN FRAN- 
'€ISCO, AND THENCE TO THE BRITISH COLONIES. THE FOUR OVER- 
LAND AMERICAN ROUTES. POSTAL. 

There are at present seven routes open to the traveller, 
by any one of which he can reach the colonies on the 
Pacific. Of these, three are by water or chiefly so, and 
the others across the continent. In the order mentioned, 
I shall shortly describe each of these routes. 

The only direct way to reach Vancouver Island and 
British Columbia at present, is to take advantage of any 
vessel sailing from London or Liverpool that may offer. 
Exceeding 17,000 miles, this passage is the longest that 
can be taken from England to any known port rounding 
either cape, unless it be to some place in the neighbour- 
hood of Sitka, or Petrapaulouski ; little short of five 
months *, it occupies a considerable fraction of a man's 
life time : let us cherish the idea that it will be super- 
seded, before the surface gold of British Columbia 
begins to be exhausted, or the country converted into 
a succession of distorted ridges and unsightly mounds, 
by a North Pacific British Emigrant and Postal route, 



* Sir E. B. Lytton to Gov. Douglas, Sept. 2, 1858: "I may 
further observe, that a ship has been chartered, and is in course of 
preparation for the conveyance of the larger portion of this detach- 
ment by the Horn ; but as the passage will consume nearly four 
months, and it is desirable that you should have the " &c. (This 
should have read five months.) 



ROUTES : — BY LOJS'G SEA. 85- 

which, as is elsewhere shown, could be opened at an 
expenditure of about 250,000/. and by which the 
colonies could be reached at least a week sooner than 
now by Panama, the quickest route, and at a fraction of 
the expense of the latter. 

All long sea voyages are monotonous, and in this case 
remarkably so, as land is seldom seen or visited from port 
to port ; the only variety, and that not an agreeable one, 
being met with in coming round the Horn.* For any 
one who can go aloft and work his passage through, such 
a voyage seems sensible enough ; but, for an unoccupied 
passenger to vegetate for five months at sea is a matter 
of much greater difficulty. 

In short, if the reader will take up any published 
account of a very long sea voyage and read it two or 
three times over, he will have read what I must have 
written, had I described in detail the only British route 
existing to Her Majesty's colonies in the North Pacific. 
This voyage is very nearly as expensive as that by 
Panama, without taking into account the value of the 
passenger's time. 

In addition to this, supposing an emigrant bound to 
British Columbia to have arrived by sea - at Esquimalt 
Harbour, he is obliged to retrace his steps eastward a 
considerable way in order to reach his destination. 
This countermarch, as it were, will cost him as much 
as it would have cost him, in the first instance, to have 
crossed the Atlantic. 

The difficulties and even dangers which the traveller 
had to encounter in crossing the isthmus, previous to 
the partial opening of the railway in 1852, or its com- 
pletion at a cost exceeding a million sterling, in 1855, 
are still fresh in the recollection of many. 

* See Appendix, page 154, 
g 3 



86 BY NEW YOEK AND PANAMA. 

Who that crossed it then can forget the heat and 
filth of Chagres, the packs of curs and flocks of buzzards, 
the struggle in bungos and with boatmen up the river, 
the scenes of riot and debauchery at the villages, jungle 
fever, and the bones that marked the mule tracks 
through the plains of Panama, and stamped that short 
but fatal route of fifty miles, as the Golgotha of the 
West? 

All this is changed now : after an interesting voyage 
of seven or eight days from New York, in a first-class 
steamer, supplied with every comfort and luxury that 
can be desired, Aspinwall is reached. During the 
voyage, the traveller will have seen the low coral islands 
of the Bahamas, and coasted along the shores of Cuba, 
in colour and elevation contrasting happily with the hills 
of San Domingo and the blue mountains of Jamaica. 

Luckily there is no detention at the town of Aspin- 
wall, where all the inconveniences of Chagres are met 
with in a milder and mitigated form. Once in the cars 
— the railway passes through a deep marsh which it 
quits at Gatun on the Chagres : thence traversing a 
dense tropical forest, with occasional clearances and ha- 
ciendas, and arriving at Barbacoas, it crosses the river, 
and the summit from which Balboa discovered the 
Pacific is seen. As the traveller advances, he obtains 
views of the river, reflecting from its bright surface the 
deep rich greens of the tropical jungle or forest, or the 
blossoming parasites which hang in festoons above the 
banks. Having passed the summit level, the scene 
changes, and at a distance the level savannahs and the 
spires of Panama are descried. 

In the meantime the telegraph has done its work, 
and the Pacific steamer is in readiness to convey the 
passengers to San Francisco. So that the whole time 



BY W. INDIA OR KOYAL MAIL STEAMER. 87 

occupied in the transit of the isthmus, does not exceed 
five hours. 

By these very expeditious arrangements, the passen- 
ger loses the chance of seeing many a magnificent pile 
of Moorish architecture, half overgrown with tropical 
vegetation; the remains of old Panama, its broken 
down bridges, and the bay in front, the resort of 
innumerable sea-fowl, from the sand-piper and sea-gull 
to the red flamingo and stately pelican. But in missing 
these, and many other objects of the greatest beauty 
and deepest interest, the dangers of taking Panama 
fever, to which Europeans on a first visit are particularly 
liable, is greatly diminished ; as well as the risk of being 
riddled with jiggers and galipatos, or on waking some 
morning to find one's hair converted into a flourishing 
nest of ants. 

Aspinwall can be reached in about the same time, six- 
teen to twenty days, by the Eoyal Mail fine of steamers,, 
via St. Thomas from Southampton, as it can, via New 
York from Liverpool. But as the connection between 
the Eoyal Mail Line and American conveyances is very 
imperfect, I recommend travellers, unless very patriotic,, 
to avoid it. Having been myself a victim, and in con- 
sequence of doing so, detained fifteen days on the 
isthmus, I speak from experience. Besides which, the 
British fine is dearer for passengers, and twice as dear 
for letters. 

Panama to San Francisco occupies about fourteen 
days. Being a coasting voyage, in a steamer resem- 
bling a floating hotel, in the still waters of the Pacific,, 
if not overcrowded, the passage is a very agreeable 
one. Having passed the beautiful islands of Tobago 
and Taboquilla, the Pearl Islands loom in the distance. 
The views of the mountains of Mexico and the isthmus 

&4 



88 TEHUANTEPEC AND NICARAGUA. 

are constantly changing. Half-way is Acapuleo, where 
the steamers stop to coal. The city, beautifully situated 
among groves of cocoa and palm, at the base of moun- 
tains which rise from the edge of the harbour, one of 
the most perfect in the world, is still a relic of the 
former times of Spain. The colouring is exquisite : the 
Mexicans in the market-place, selling fruits, shells, and 
pearls, which seem to be the staple commodities ; the 
old Spanish churches and wells ; divers swimming round 
the steamers ; and coaling by torch-light, are studies of 
peculiar interest. 

The traveller will do well to avoid the Tehuantepec 
route via New Orleans, semi-monthly, as in its pre- 
sent condition the road is comparatively useless alike 
for purposes of travel and postal communication. The 
land portion of the transit across the isthmus — being 
upwards of a hundred miles in length — consists of 
an unpaved and imperfectly graded road, passing over 
a precipitous mountain, and barely practicable for 
wheeled vehicles ; and, in consequence, a mail made up 
of a few light sacks is all that the contractors have 
carried, and all, it is presumed, that they have been 
able to carry since the commencement of the service.* 

But as the Nicaragua route, likewise frorcfNew York 
to San Francisco, is about to be reopened, and as I passed 
over it twice, I shall here shortly describe it, although 
not counted among the seven routes mentioned at the 
commencement of this chapter. 

Compared with the Panama route, there is a saving 
by it of 700 miles. The whole distance from San 
Juan del Nor, on the Atlantic, to San Juan del Sud, on 
the Pacific, is 212 miles. 



* Vide also Panama Star and Herald, Jan. 17, 1860. 



THE SAN JUAN RIVER. 89 

Ascending, in a small but comfortable steamer the 
river St. Juan, in nineteen hours the traveller reaches 
the Castilio rapids, and changes steamers ; five hours 
more take him to Port Carlos, where the river joins 
Lake Nicaragua ; there, changing steamers again, twelve 
hours take him across the lake to Virgin Bay, con- 
nected with the Pacific by a very agreeable mule ride 
of three or four hours, the last figures depending to a 
great extent upon the natural disposition of the animal 
the traveller may happen to select. 

In Central America generally, extending into Mexico, 
the rainy season commences about the 1st of May, and 
continues almost without intermission from 5, or 5^ 
months in the former, to 4 months in the latter ; at 
any other time, to any one unaccustomed to tropical 
scenery, nothing can be more enjoyable than a tour 
through this country. The banks of the San Juan are 
clothed with evergreen forest, the dense foliage of 
which, thickly interwoven with blossoming vines, 
blossoming parasites, and blossoming cactuses, hangs 
over the water and hides the banks. The infinite 
variety of this forest is indescribable ; mahogany and 
logwood, looking like ash and acacia ; mangroves, each 
supported by innumerable stems ; extending branches, 
bound to the earth by what look like ropes and perfectly 
twisted cables ; bamboos like feathers, and palms like 
plumes ; cocoa-nuts and palmettos, bananas and plan- 
tains, with their gigantic leaves and dangling fruits, 
bewilder the beholder. Nor is the scene wanting in 
animation, enlivened as it is by flights of macaws, 
parrots, buzzards, &c. ; in the trees, monkeys, nearly all 
ring-tailed ; egrets and cranes pacing the sand-bars, and 
huge alligators basking in the mud. Where the banks 
are clear, occasional haciendas are passed ; the houses 



90 OVERLAND AMERICAN ROUTES. 

two-thirds roof, built of bamboo and thatched with 
palm, are more like hermitages or moss-houses than 
anything else, and the dusky inmates invariably rush 
out to hail the steamers passing. The lake is beautiful ; 
the conical islands of Omatepec, some 4000 or 5000 feet 
high, with distant mountains rising majestically in the 
back-ground, and the crumbling fortresses built to 
repel the Buccaneers, buried in vegetation as they are,, 
form the most beautiful pictures conceivable.* 

The passage from San Francisco to Vancouver Island 
in an American steamer occupies four or five days. It 
thus appears, allowing for slight detentions at New- 
York and San Francisco, 4 London to Vancouver Island, 
via the isthmus, is made in about forty-five days, and 
that the enormous expenses, 80 £. to 100/., and the fact 
of their being so very circuitous, are the main objec- 
tions to the routes via Panama, Nicaragua, or Tehuan- 
tepec, as thoroughfares to the British Colonies. 

In shortly describing the four overland routes in 
American territory by which travellers can reach San 
Francisco, it should be premised, that although it is 
customary to admit that the unremitting efforts of 
America to spread her republic in the West have been 
very successful, the gigantic character of the works 
undertaken with this view, and to connect the Eastern 
States with the Pacific, and the enterprise and liberality 
with which they are, in the teeth of obstacles almost 
insurmountable, carried out, are by no means so gene- 
rally understood. 

Of this truth a very remarkable illustration occurs in 
(No. 1), the great overland route from St. Louis and 

* An interesting account of the town of Sun Juan will be found 
in Harper, Dec. 1854. 



. ST. LOUIS TO SAN FRANCISCO. 91 

Memphis, via El Paso, to San Francisco, which is now 
more used than any of the other continental routes. 
The mail service by it is semi- weekly during the tra- 
velling season ; it is subsidised by the United States 
Government at $600,000 per annum, and is the longest 
mail-coach road in existence, being, from St. Louis to 
San Francisco, 2765 miles. It is travelled night and 
day by four-horsed coaches, and with perfect regularity ; 
the distance is accomplished in twenty-two days. The 
cost to a passenger is about 20Z., and hi. or so in addi- 
tion, incurred for meals, which are obtained at regulated 
charges and fixed stopping-places along the road. 
Each passenger is allowed 50 lbs. of baggage, and can, 
at any place he pleases, await the next coach, of which 
he is three days in advance. For the first few days 
the process is found excessively fatiguing, but after a 
little practice the traveller sleeps regularly and soundly 
in the carriage, and finds enjoyment in the constant 
change and varied scenes experienced. This route is 
admirably provided with horses, mules, and coaches. 
Military stations have been established at regular inter- 
vals along the entire route ; each station has a guard of 
twenty-five men, well armed; this force is thought ample, 
considering the manner in which the buildings themselves, 
on a principle similar to that of the martello towers in 
Ireland, are constructed to resist effectually any num- 
ber of hostile Indians, at one time likely to collect in a 
single body. Each train of emigrants, who seldom use 
the coaches, but drive their own teams and carry their 
own Penates, is guarded through the wilderness by 
twenty-five men, who take this duty in rotation, and 
are thus kept fully occupied. In this way the emi- 
grant is provided with information as to halting 
places, water and provender for his cattle, fuel, &c, as 
he advances. 



92 SAN ANTONIO TO SAN DIEGO. 

The vehicles used upon the- road from Fort Smith, 
westward, are of the description known as "celerity 
coaches." Built like a common coach, the body is hung 
on springs in the usual way ; instead, however, of the 
heavy wooden top, with iron railings round, in com- 
mon use, they are roofed with canvass, lightly sup- 
ported, as in the case of a common waggon. This 
covering affords ample protection against the weather, 
while it greatly diminishes the weight of the vehicle, 
and its liability to upset. The rolling stock on this 
line consists of 100 such coaches. The route in some 
places passes through long stretches of the Great Ameri- 
can Desert, quite destitute of water ; in one case there 
is seventy-five miles of barren sand. In these localities 
the stations are supplied by regular water-trams, fitted 
up expressly for the purpose. The waggons used carry 
large tanks, which resemble the boilers of a steam-boat, 
and, for sake of lightness, are made of block tin ; each 
waggon is drawn by four mules. These teams convey 
water regularly to the different stations, where reser- 
voirs are built to receive and preserve it for the use of 
passengers, and the employees and stock of the com- 
pany contracting. This is, of course, a very expensive 
way to get water, but as every effort to' procure it 
otherwise has failed, there is no alternative. Work- 
shops and smithies are, of course, established at inter- 
vals along the road. 

Of the next route (No. 2), from San Antonio, via 
El Paso, to San Diego, semi-monthly, (weekly from San 
Antonio to El Paso and Fort Yuma), it will be suffi- 
cient to mention shortly, that the San Diego and San 
Antonio route consists of a weekly mail service, 
receiving a subsidy from the government of $200,000 
per annum ; that the distance between the two places 



SANTA FE AND SALT LAKE ROUTES. 93 

named is by it 1570 miles, travelled by the stages in 
28 days ; the most serious objection to this route is 
that passengers. are detained at one place on the road 
before being carried through to San Francisco. 

The third route (No. 3) opened to San Francisco, is 
the Kansas and Stockton, passing through Santa Fe. 
The service is monthly, and the subsidy from the United 
States government is $80,000 per annum ; the entire 
distance from Kansas city to Stockton is 2026 miles ; it 
is generally regarded as an exceedingly level and rather 
monotonous road. 

The last route (No. 4) is from San Joseph and Placer- 
ville, via Salt Lake City. By this route the distance 
from San Joseph to San Francisco is 1770 miles, and 
time taken to travel there, 38 days. It is a weekly 
mail service, for the carrying of which the United States 
government pays $320,000 per annum. This is the 
high road to Utah, and is said to be better connected 
than the other routes with Washington and Oregon, the 
stretches of sand seldom exceed twenty miles, and it is 
the highway over which nearly all the earliest emi- 
grants to California travelled. These routes are coloured 
pink on the annexed map, mere branch roads being 
coloured blue. 

To describe minutely each of these routes, the proper 
time to start, the country traversed, and the equipment 
required, would far exceed the limits of this publication. 
To those interested I would recommend the perusal of 
a small book, the " Prairie Traveller," by Capt. Marcy, 
published in New York in 1859, which contains 
" itineraries " of the principal routes from the Mississipi 
to the Pacific. 

I have, in the foregoing, omitted to include among 
the routes to British Columbia and Vancouver Island, 



94 VERA CRUZ TO ACAPULCO. 

the trail via Bed Kiver, North Sascatchewan, and the 
Punch-bowl Pass in the Eocky Mountains, or other simi- 
lar trails usually travelled by the brigades of the Hudson's 
Bay Company. To hardy trappers, lightly equipped, 
and confident in their knowledge of the passes of the 
country and its resources, as well as from their skill in 
woodcraft and mastery over the Indians, these routes 
are perfectly safe, but should not be encountered by 
strangers or emigrants. The Fort Benton route I omit, 
as unfinished and described in .another place. The 
various routes through Mexico are rendered unsafe by 
brigands, who take advantage of internal dissensions 
and perpetual insurrections to pillage travellers where- 
ever they meet them ; one-third of the nation are high- 
way robbers, and, whether Castileon and Chemorrow or 
Juarez and Miramon contend, under cover of the 
political darkness which always pervades that beautiful 
country, practise their avocation with unparalleled 
audacity and impunity : otherwise, something would 
have to be said of the stage route from Vera Cruz 
through the ancient and beautiful city of Mexico to 
Acapulco, connecting with steamers on either side. 

Meagre as the sketch above given of the principal 
American overland emigrant routes is, it is sufficient 
to show that America has already connected her pos- 
sessions on the Pacific with the Eastern States, by 8131 
miles of mail-coach road, opened and maintained by the 
nation at a gross expenditure of #1,196,447 per annum. 
And when to the postal subsidies paid by the American 
government to the four overland lines just described, 
are added #738,250 annually paid to the contractors to 
carry the mails from New York and New Orleans via 
Panama to San Francisco semi-monthly, and from New 
Orleans to San Francisco, via Tehuantepec, also semi- 



UNITED STATES POSTAL EXPENDITURE TO PACIFIC. 95 

monthly, $250,000 per annum, on the same account ; 
and for local mail service, $508,697 per amium, which 
was the case in 1859, we find that America has been 
disbursing, on the plea of carrying the mails to the 
North Pacific, but in reality, to open up communication 
to the country and to colonise it *, in round numbers 
550,000/. annually, and incurring an annual loss on this 
account of 377,000/. This expenditure is quite inde- 
pendent of the cost of her military roads, such as the 
Fort Benton route, described in the next chapter, — that 
from Fort Smith to the Colorado, &c. ; and as, according 
to the statements of the Postmaster-General (of this year), 
the population in whose favour this enormous outlay is 
incurred does not exceed 650,000 f persons, the Ame- 
rican portion of the coast of the Pacific is peopled at a 
cost to the Federal Government, amounting to 17s. 
annually for each settler or emigrant, including all ages 
and conditions. 

* A comparison of the expenses and products of the routes named, 
leaves no room for doubt that the postal communication which they 
afford is not looked to by the government as an end, but as an in- 
strument for the advancement of ulterior objects. Indeed, it has not 
been concealed, but openly avowed by the friends of the policy 
which maintained these routes, that they were intended as the 
pioneers of civilisation ; as the means of rapid and regular com- 
munication between remote military posts and the government, and 
most especially as an instrumentality for promoting the settlement 
of our frontiers, and thus appreciating the value of the national 
domain. — Report of Postmaster- General U. S., Dec. 3, 1859. 

In England also, " The decision on Post-Office contracts is not 
a mere Post-Office question, but frequently involves considerations 
of an imperial character, affecting our political relations, our colonial 
empire, the efficiency of our army and navy, and the spread of our 
commerce." — First Rep. Sel. Com. Packet and Telegraphic Con- 
tracts.— May 22, 1860. 

f I am, however, of opinion that those figures are understated. — 
J. D. P. 



96 BRITISH POSTAL EXPENDITURE TO PACIFIC. 

Under these circumstances, it is not surprising that 
the Americans should, for a long time back, have carried, 
without caring for remuneration, from San Francisco 
to the British colonies, our little mail bag, the mo- 
derate dimensions of which are preserved by a high 
charge on letters, a charge on neivspapers equal to 
their cost, and a practical prohibition of pamphlets, 
and of books however small. 



97 



chap. vn. 

PROPOSED BRITISH EMIGRANT AND POSTAL ROUTE TO THE PACIFIC 
FROM CANADA, SOUTH OF THE LAKES, THROUGH RED RIVER AND 

BRITISH COLUMBIA, TO VANCOUVER ISLAND. TRADE WITH CHINA 

AND JAPAN. POSTAL COMMUNICATIONS WITH AUSTRALIA. CON- 
CLUSIONS ARRIVED AT. 

Centueies* have elapsed since England first entertained 
the dream of a north-west passage for her vessels 
trading to India and the China seas, and during no 
portion of that period was the search more energetically 
conducted than within the last thirty years. That dream 
is now dispelled ; and in passing through those icy 
portals in 1850-51, M'Clure, more fortunate than his 
gallant competitors, may be said, as far as mercantile 
interests are concerned, to have closed the gates behind 
him. The apathy that usually succeeds expectations 
disappointed, where every effort has been made to 
ensure success, did not in this case last long ; for in 1857 
our legislators and the public seem to have been struck 
with the fact, that in searching for a north-west passage 
in the Polar seas, they had overlooked the true north- 
west passage which exists in British territory, north of 
49°, and that if a tithe of the exertion and expenditure 
incurred in investigating the former route had been 
applied to the latter, the original intention would long 
before this have been realised, f 

* 1495. 

f The expenditure of Great Britain on Arctic expeditions from 
1800 to 1845 alone exceeded 1,000,0007. sterling. 

H 



I2>, ,.-_■ W6 HE 


i y y — 




sIPis 




* "^^ i * c lt^"S 1 -^ >J 




'^^rfVlW^^jtt^'l 


■^L v^ 



iUap ot tin; 

Win ASffiEMC^M 

MAIL ROUTES. 

CORRECTED U P TO 1860 

I1Y ,1.1). PEMBERTON. 




98 A RAILWAY IMPRACTICABLE AT PRESENT. 

True, however, to the principle that inventions in 
their earlier stages assume the most complicated forms, 
every project that has been hitherto brought promin- 
ently under the notice of the public or of government, 
having in view the connection of the Atlantic with the 
Pacific, has been wanting in the essential requisite prac- 
ticability, and has been set aside, not owing to want of 
interest in the subject, but to the complexity of arrange- 
ments involved. Reports of exploring parties sent out 
by our own and the Canadian governments, by the 
Hudson's Bay Company, and the United States, furnish 
us with evidence in itself sufficient not only to reason but, 
better still, to act upon ; and, I shall endeavour to show 
how, by divesting this subject of the incumbrances 
which have been hitherto supposed properly to belong 
to it, the attainment of the desired end is quite within 
our reach, and that the communication to, and connec- 
tion of, the north-west colonies, of the kind most 
required, can be effected at an outlay inconsiderable 
when compared with the great national interests at 
stake. 

It is hardly necessary for me to commence by stating, 
that, however desirable an interoceanic railway, passing 
entirely through British territory, might be; it is imprac- 
ticable at present, and will continue to be so, until the 
population in the country through which it should pass 
shall be sufficiently numerous to justify its construction. 

At present the country north of 49°, through which 
it would have to pass, may be said to be uninhabited, 
and it would take a season to estimate how many 
years would elapse, and how many millions be ex- 
pended, before such a work would be finished. 

Great stress has been laid on the advantage English 
merchants would derive from it, shortening, as it would, 



EMIGRANT ROUTE PROPOSED. 99 

the route to China and the Asiatic coast by some 3000 
miles ; but it may reasonably be doubted whether to 
them the saving of interest on capital would not be 
more than counterbalanced by the additional cost of 
transhipping the goods, and of land carriage for 2500 
or 3000 miles, and whether, after all, our teas and 
silks might not continue to be transmitted by sea. 

To the emigrant speed is not so much an object as 
certainty and economy. On the great overland route 
from St. Louis to California, fewer emigrants travel in 
the stages than on horseback, driving before them the 
cattle that are to stock their future farms ; attending 
waggons carry the wife and children, and pack mules 
the provisions. They choose the best time of year, 
and the cavalcade proceeds leisurely along ; double 
time is occupied in the journey, but the stock and 
merchandise which they take with them are worth more 
than double, when they reach the west coast, what 
they cost in the States, which amply compensates for 
the delay. The advantage of a railroad over a good 
waggon road, would be felt more by tourists than by 
emigrants ; and with regard to postal arrangements, 
since in either case a line of telegraph would be estab- 
lished, the superiority of the railroad is, even in this 
respect, not so very considerable ; and, lastly, for the 
conveyance of troops in the event of a war, so long a 
track would be so liable to interruption, that for war 
purposes a railway could not be depended upon. But 
since, from its utter impracticability at present, it is 
needless further to discuss the advantages or disad- 
vantages of a railroad that cannot now be made, I shall 
proceed at once to describe, in a general way, the 
nature of the communication required to connect the 
colonies, how easily this might be effected, and then to 



100 MIXED CHARACTER OF PROPOSED ROUTE. 

explain in detail the grounds on which the opinions 
brought forward, or assertions made, are based. 

Looking at the map of the Canadas, their railroads 
extend westward as far as Sydenham on the Ottawa 
Eiver and (the Grand Trunk) to Detroit, on the southern 
shore of Lake Huron ; from this point a railway in 
American territory extends to La Crosse. Whatever 
line of communication is adopted, must pass through 
the Eed Eiver country, somewhere between Pembina 
and Lake Winnepeg. Assume, therefore, that Assina- 
boia is a point in this line of communication. As soon 
as it is a fact that the Eed Eiver and the Pacific are to 
be connected, the people of Wisconsin and Minnesota 
will lose no time in extending their communications to 
the junction of the Siouxwood Eiver with the Eed 
Eiver, which, as the river is there five feet deep, we 
shall call the head of steam navigation. Put a few short 
river steamers, of the class that can be built from 
1000/. to 5000/., on the Eed Eiver to connect these 
communications (180 miles) with Assinaboia. Open a 
waggon road, for which the country is particularly 
favourable, from Assinaboia, via Assinaboine Eiver and 
Quapelle Eiver and Lakes, to Elbow on south branch 
of the Sascatchewan Eiver in lat. 51° long. 107^° (430 
miles). 

Put a few steamers of the class before mentioned on 
the South Sascatchewan, to complete the communica- 
tion (300 miles), to the base of the Eocky Mountains ; 
here taking advantage of the Vermilion Pass, open a 
waggon road in the best route obtainable (400 miles) 
to Hopetown, which may be considered the head of 
navigation on the Fraser for steamers of at all consider- 
able size. 

Such is the skeleton plan or bare outline of the 



DISTANCES AND TIMES. 



101 



proposal made, the distances and times being given in 
the following table : — 



Portland to Chicago, Canada Grand Trunk . . 

Chicago* to St. Paul's (if by railway) 

St. Paul's to Pembina (if by railway) 

Pembina to Elbow, waggon road 

On South Sascatchewan, by steamer 

From pass of Rocky Mountains across stream to 

Hopetown by waggon road 

Hopetown to Victoria by steamer 

Portland to Victoria . . , . 



Miles. 


Time. 




days. hrs. 


1008 


2 


350 


1 6 


450 


15 


500 


10 


300 


1 12 


400 


8 


170 


1 


3178 


24 9 



In short, the advantages of this route might be 
summed up as follows: — that by opening it in the 
cheap way suggested, while you connect together all 
the colonies of British North America, an emigrant 
from England could reach Victoria in one week shorter 
time than he can now do by Panama, the quickest and 
most expensive route. 

I am confident that the roads on this route can be 
opened for traffic with 100,000/., and 100,000/. more 
ought to be ample to construct half-a-dozen river 
steamers (at 5000/! each) to build workshops, stables, 
and defences, sufficient to commence with, as well as 
to pay for superintendance of works in process of con- 
struction ; the total estimate being 200,000/., the ex- 
penditure of which would be spread over an interval of 
three years. 

For, as I shall show, the link between Chicago and 

* At present two trains daily from Chicago to La Crosse (thirteen 
honrs) connect with two lines of steamers on the Mississippi to St. 
Paul's, in summer ; and in winter stage coaches on the roads replace 
the steamers. 



h 3 



102 ESTIMATE. 

Ked Kiver would not cost any thing to the promoters ; 
a waggon road from Pembina or Assinaboine to the 
Elbow is already travelled by wheeled carriages, and 
50/. per mile would make the road a tolerably good one. 
The road connecting the Sascatchewan with Fort Hope 
would cost 200/. per mile ; Hopetown is already con- 
nected by steamers with Victoria. 

Before entering further into detail, the reader may per- 
haps be disposed to admit, that the line is a very promis- 
ing, one, and the sum comparatively small ; but to ask, 
Where is the 2 0,0 1, to be obtained ? The answer is as 
follows; — Government would only have to encourage and 
suggest, and contractors would be found ready to com- 
pete to open this road and maintain it on some such 
terms as the following : — The contractor or private 
company to find the capital required, and establish the 
line. To run bi-weekly conveyances both ways, while 
the season should be open ; passengers' fares and freight 
being liable to revision, bound to carry horses, cattle, 
&c, in the steam boats across the Sascatchewan 
plains, as want of fuel, &c, would make this part of 
the route difficult to emigrants. The contractor to 
have a right to levy small tolls, also liable to revision, 
on travellers using the road but not the vehicles. The 
Government on their part to guarantee 6 per cent, on the 
capital, which at the worst could not exceed 12,000Z. 
per annum, diminished by whatever postal assets the line 
should realise, — to pay the contractor something for 
carrying the mails, which would diminish the risk of 
loss to him ; and, with regard to the termination of the 
contract, the Government would of course reserve the 
right, notice having been given, to pay off the contractor 
at any time, at a valuation of his works and stock. If 
the line paid more than 12 per cent., the surplus might 



COMPETITION. 103 

form a sinking fund. The effect would be, that the 
lands all along the line of road to be opened, 1200 
miles, would be so enhanced in value, that the proceed- 
ing might be made a source of revenue, instead of a 
loss to the country. 

There can be no grounds to apprehend that the 
receipts of this road would be liable to be diminished 
by a competing line south of 49°. On the contrary, 
I shall have occasion to show that it is more reasonable 
to suppose that the British line would draw off a con- 
siderable proportion of the traffic of the valley of the 
Columbia Eiver. 



To enter more into detail, let us examine first the 
principal obstacle, to the route, — the Eocky Mountain 
Chain. 

For the last ten years the talent of Westpoint has 
been concentrated upon this subject, endeavouring to 
solve in a practical manner, within American territory, 
the problem we are now considering ; and we cannot 
examine the reports of their numerous explorations, 
without admitting that, although baffled by the natural 
barriers, which exist for a distance of 1200 miles south 
of 49°, their military engineers have done their duty 
admirably. 

In endeavouring to connect the Mississippi with the 
Pacific, they have thoroughly explored eight different 
routes, and for 1000 miles south of 49°, no single pass 
in the Eocky Mountains has been detected less than 
6000 feet high, and which does not present difficulties 
far greater than are met with in the passes north of 
49°, — a result very clearly expressed in the following 
table : — 

H 4 



104 PASSES IN ROCKY MOUNTAINS SOUTH OF 49' 











.c 


j= 








o3 
a 


6 

3 
o 
P3 


1 


60 

3 
O 
u 


CO 

3 
O 


a 








"3 


O 


U . 




8 2 




Description of Route 


*2 


o 
p. 

o 


•a 

s 


p 




* 3 
QD O 


Remarks. 


examined. 


CO 

a 


a. 
.0 


1 
< 


11 
1^ 




s2 

|8 






1 


1 


*s 


© 


o 


s 






s 


3 


s 

3 
00 


6 
Miles. 


6 


s 

3 






Miles . 


Miles. 


Feet. 


Miles. 


Feet. 




Route near 47th ~) 
and 49th parallel. > 
St. Paul to Seattle. J 


1410 


2025 


19,100 


535 


1490 


6044 


C Cadotte's Pass. 
J (If a railway )Tun- 
j nel proposed at ele- 
vation of 5219 ft. 
i Cadotte's Pass. 


St. Paul to Van- 1 
couver. J 


1455 


1864 


18,100 


374 


1490 


6044 


J (If a railway)Tun- 
1 nel proposed at ele- 
vation of 5219 ft. 


Route near 41° and"] 
















42°- Via South 1 
Pass from Council f 


1410 


2032 


29,120 


632 


1400 


8373 




Bluff to Benicia. J 
















Route near 38° and " 
















39°. Westport to 
San Francisco by 
theCoo-che-to-pah 


1740 


2080 


49,986 


620 


1660 


10032 


f Tunnel proposed 
< at elevation ol 
[9540 ft.! 


and Tala-ee-chay- 














pah Passes. 
















Route near 38° and " 
















39°. Westport to 
San Francisco by 
the Coo-che-to- 
pah and Madelin 


1740 


2290 


56,514 


670 


1620 


10032 


f Tunnel proposed 
< at elevation of 
[9540 ft. ! 


Passes. 
















35°. Fort Smith 1 
to San Pedro. J 


1360 


1892 


48,812 


416 


1476 


7472 


*■ 


35°. Fort Smith? 
to San Francisco. ) 


1360 


2174 


50,670 


644 


1530 






32°. Fulton to San > 
Pedro. 5 


1400 


1618 


32,784 


408 


1210 


5717 


C Average estimate 


32°. Fulton to San "1 
Francisco. J 














of foregoing 


1620 


2039 


42,008 


759 


1280 


5717 


< routes exceeding 














20,000,000/. steri- 
















le ing (if for railway.) 



To determine the places in the Eocky Mountains 
where the first and second of the routes mentioned in 
the table should cross, seven passes were examined: 
1st. Maria's Pass, tunnel at 8000 or 8500 ft. (limit of 



KANANASKIS AND VERMILION PASSES. 105 

perpetual snow in that latitude) ; 2nd. Lewis and 
Clark's, 6323 elevation, 2^ miles of tunnel through rock 
proposed, so as to obtain approaches 40 ft. — 60 ft. per 
mile (1 in 132) ; Cadotte's Pass, tunnel 4^ miles long, to 
obtain approaches 40 ft. — 60 ft. per mile. The remain- 
ing passes are even worse than these. 

North of 49° the depressions in the Kocky Mountains 
are much greater. Of the Kananaskis pass, Captain 
Palliser says that with but little expense it could be 
rendered available for carts. He describes it as a gorge 
winding through the mountains, among cliffs of a 
tremendous height, and adds that his onward progress 
was not impeded by obstacles of any consequence, the 
only difficulty he experienced being occasioned by 
quantities of fallen timber, caused by fires. The extreme 
height of this pass is 5985 ft. In descending on the 
western slope, he writes, " This portion of our route 
continued for several days through dense masses of 
fallen timber destroyed by fire, where our progress was 
very slow, not owing to any difficulty of the mountains, 
but on account of the fallen timber, which we had to 
climb over and then to chop through, to enable the 
horses to step or jump over it." Here he learned from 
the Kootanies, that there was a very plain and easy 
road to Fort Colville, distant eight days from their 
camp. 

Without dwelling longer on the advantages of 
this pass, I turn to that described by Dr. Hector, a little 
to the north of the former, called Vermilion Pass, of 
which the extreme elevation is 4944 ft. " Dr. Hector 
followed the S. Sascatchewan Eiver right up to the main 
watershed of the continent ; then followed it until he 
reached a transverse watershed, which divides the 
waters of the Columbia and N. Sascatchewan Eiver, on 
the one hand, from those of the Kootanie and S. Sascat- 



106 FORT BENTON ROUTE. 

chewan Eivers on the other. There he found the facilities 
for crossing the mountains so great as to leave little 
doubt in his mind of the practicability of constructing 
even a railroad connecting the plains of the Sascatchewan 
with the opposite side of the main chain of the Eocky 
Mountains." Dr. Hector, writing of this pass, says, "The 
ascent to the watershed from the Sascatchewan is hardly 
perceptible to the traveller, and no labour would be 
required, except that of hewing timber to construct 
an easy road for carts, by which it might be attained." 
And again, "A road for carts down the valley of 
Vermilion Eiver from the height of land to the 
Kootanie Eiver, could be cleared without difficulty; for 
supposing the road to follow a straight line along the 
river, and the descent to be uniform, which it almost is, 
the incline would only be forty feet in a mile." To gain 
a similar grade in American territory would require 
several miles of tunnel through rock as before shown. 

All idea of constructing a railway within the limits 
of the barrier described having been abandoned, 
America is now endeavouring to open the second route 
in the table, on a principle similar to that I am now 
advocating within British territory ; a special appro- 
priation having been made by Congress to connect 
Fort Walla by a military road with Fort Benton on 
the Missouri. The work has been commenced, and 
260 miles of the road completed. Steam-boats can 
navigate Oregon Eiver to Fort Walla Walla, and the 
Missouri to Fort Benton, thus affording, except for 
the interval of 600 miles, a line of steam-boat communi- 
cation between the Atlantic and Pacific, across the 
widest part of the States*, being 250 miles south of the 

* This is after all a rather roundabout arrangement. Railways 



ROUTE TO SEATTLE. 107 

line proposed, and passing through the great American 
desert; an additional difficulty, so well understood, 
that Congress made a special appropriation for the 
purpose of sinking artesian wells there ; which was 
done, but without success, in reporting upon which the 
Secretary of war writes, Dec. 1. 1859: "It may 
be considered now as demonstrated, that to bring 
water from subterraneous streams to overflow the 
surfaces of the great western plains is, for any reason- 
able amount of expenditure, impracticable." In short, 
taking into consideration the mountain pass, the 
hopelessly barren nature of the country traversed, and 
the circumstance of its having for its outlet the bar of 
the Columbia instead of the Straits of De Fuca, this 
route cannot compete with that proposed to be made 
in British territory. 

It cannot be urged that the extension of the American 
line to Seattle, a port on the east side of Puget Sound, 
as talked of, would make the comparison more favour- 
able to the American line ; by it the distance of St. 
Paul's from Seattle, is 2025 miles, of which, 1152 miles 
would pass through an uncultivated region, " affording 
but little game at uncertain seasons, and at a late season 
not a sufficiency of grass for animals.* 

Governor Stevens f of Minnesota, " believes that the 
most desirable route to the Pacific will be found in the 
possession of Great Britain, and that a great interoceanic 
communication is more likely to be constructed through 
the Sascatchewan basin than across the American 

westward to the Missouri end at Council Bluffs. The distance by 
train from St. Paul's to Fort Union, is 700 miles. Vide Itinerary of 
Capt. Marcy, W. S., published in 1859, in " Prairie Traveller." 

* Mr. Martin M c Leod, an American authority. 

f Report Select Committee to House of Representatives, Leg. 
Minnesota, 1858'. 



108 THE GRAND TRUNK RAILWAY. 

desert — the cretaceous and comparatively rainless 
areas of the southern latitudes within the territories of 
the United States." 

As there is nothing to apprehend from competition, 
let us examine a little further into the detail of the 
line proposed, and the soil and climate of the country 
through which it passes. 

The construction of a road from Canada round the 
north shore of Lake Superior, is not proposed, on ac- 
count of the engineering difficulties, severity of the cli- 
mate compared with that to the south of the lake, and 
because the country through which it would have to 
pass is utterly useless for settlement. On these points 
Dr. Eae's evidence in 1857 was conclusive. But adopt- 
ing the more southern route will not prevent the busi- 
ness of Eed Eiver and Sascatchewan, as well as that of 
Minnesota and Wisconsin passing through Canada. On 
this point nothing can be more conclusive than the 
Eeport of the United States Postmaster General to his 
own Government, dated December 3, 1859. When 
writing of the Canadian line of steamers, between Port- 
land and Liverpool, he says, " This line is hereafter to 
run weekly, Portland being the terminus on this side 
during the winter, and Quebec during the summer 
season ; and in connection with the Grand Trunk Eail- 
w r ay over the Victoria Bridge at Montreal, now com- 
pleted, it will afford the means of the most direct and 
probably the most expeditious communication between 
Chicago and Liverpool. Arrangements have been made 
with the Canadian Post-office department to transport, 
for the sea-postage, any mails it may be desirable to 
send by this line ; and, in order to give them as much 
expedition as possible, it -is intended to have Chicago 
and Detroit, as well as Portland, constituted Offices of 



ROUTE SOUTH OF THE LAKES. 109 

Exchange, for United States and British mails. Bags 
will then be made up at each of these offices, and will 
not be opened until they reach Liverpool. The run- 
ning time from Chicago to Portland, via Detroit, To- 
ronto, &c, is not expected to exceed forty-eight hours, 
and either from Portland or from the contemplated 
terminus of the railway, near the mouth of the Eiver 
St. Lawrence, where the mails are to be transferred to 
and from the steamship, the distance to Liverpool is 
several hundred miles less than from New York." Be- 
sides, there is nothing to prevent Canada from extend- 
ing, in connection with her steamers on Lake Superior, 
road or railway communication westward to Pembina ; 
which with her usual energy, would, if practicable, be 
likely to follow as a sequence to the plan proposed, 
which (proposal) if encumbered with this additional 
consideration must necessarily be greatly delayed in its 
execution. It is further to be recollected that all the 
works proposed to be executed are confined to British 
territory. The objection that a small portion of the 
route proposed must at first pass through American 
territory cannot stand, for this is reciprocally the case 
in a dozen other instances. The traffic between Mon- 
treal and Liverpool is virtually through the State of 
Maine, &c, but, the telling argument is this: the entire 
traffic of England with her colonies in If. W. America is 
now carried by a circuitous route on American roads or 
railroads, or (the Atlantic excepted) in American steam- 
boats ; and will it not, under those circumstances, be 
desirable to adopt a plan by which for the present but 
a fractional part of that traffic will be excluded from 
British territory ? 

Eailways now connect Chicago with La Crosse, 
steamers and coaches ply from La Crosse to St. Paul's ; 



110 MINNESOTA AND PACIFIC RAILWAY COMPANY. 

so that 450 miles which separate St. Paul's from Pem- 
bina are the next consideration. North of Crow Wing 
to Pokegamma Falls, for 250 miles, the Mississippi is 
navigable for steamers drawing three feet of water, and 
the North Star steamer is said now to ply between the 
points. Also, as before mentioned, Eed Eiver is navig- 
able to its junction with Siouxwood Eiver. So that the 
head of navigation on the Mississippi is separated 
from the corresponding point on the Eed Eiver, by an 
interval of less than one hundred miles of country, par- 
ticularly favourable for the construction of a road or 
railway. But if the British road were once commenced, 
it is more than probable that a railway from La Crosse 
to Pembina would keep pace with it, my authority for 
the latter statement being as follows. By an Act of Con- 
gress (March 3, 1857), a grant of land was made to 
Minnesota, to aid in construction of a railroad, from Still- 
water via St. Paul's, to Eed Eiver. In May following, 
the Minnesota and Pacific Railway Company was in- 
corporated, and the above-mentioned lands provisionally 
transferred to them, one of the conditions being the con- 
struction of the railroad under consideration. This 
company, it appears, has actually contracted for the 
construction of eighty miles of the road, of s which fifty 
miles was to be completed by the 25th of May (1860). 
The population through which this fifty miles passes, was 
estimated at 67,000 two years ago, and if its progression 
has been as rapid as before, that 67,000 has now be- 
come 200,000. St. Paul's had then a population of 
16,000 ; St. Anthony and -Minneapolis, 10,000 ;and the 
Valley of the Mississippi and Crow Wing, is said to 
have now population and business enough, unassisted, 
to execute and maintain the work proposed, with pro- 
fit to the promoters. 



THE RED RIVER. Ill 

From* the foregoing it is evident, that while every 
effort ought to be made to form a rapid communication 
between Eed Eiver and the Western colonies on the 
Pacific, there is no necessity to encumber the under- 
taking at first, by considering or discussing the com- 
munications most required, from Eed Eiver eastward, 
to the Atlantic, — communications which are certain to 
spring into existence, contemporaneously with the 
execution of the portion of the route westward from 
Eed Eiver. 

The Eed Eiver flowing from south to north is navigable 
from 46° 23' lat., gradually deepening to sixteen feet at 
Lake Winnepeg, from soundings taken by Captain Pope. 
Captain Palhser writes of it : " My descent of the whole 
of Eed Eiver, from its principal source, has enabled 
me to judge of its great facilities for steam boat navi- 
gation." Professor Hind says that, owing to some 
sharp turns in the river, steamers intended for it should 
not exceed 120 feet in length. 

The great natural advantages for settlement of the 
valley of the Eed Eiver are too familiarly known to 
require notice here ; it is enough to say that its 
prairies, covered with long red grass, extend far up the 
Assinaboine Eiver, to the junction of which with the 
Moose Eiver there is, for upwards of 400 miles, a well 
defined track over the plains, over which the cart that 
accompanied Sir George Simpson passed without incon- 
venience. " On the east, north, and south," he says, 
" there was not a mound or tree to vary the vast ex- 
panse of greensward ; while to the west were the 
gleaming bays of the Assinaboine, separated from each 

* There is now considerable traffic in spirits and furs between 
St. Panl's and Pembina. The number of carts that arrived at St. 
Paul's from Red River in 1858, was 400. 



112 QUI-APPELLE RIVER. 

other by wooded points of considerable depth." Cap- 
tain Palliser appears also to have taken carts with him 
westward as far as the Elbow, and says that, as far as 
106° W., long, he had suffered no inconvenience from 
want of wood. 

Although Captain Palliser writes, " I have been able 
to ascertain that there exists a valuable water commu- 
nication between the south Sascatchewan and the Eed 
Eiver, and that a good-sized boat, and even perhaps a 
small steamer, might descend from the south Sascat- 
chewan, ascend the west Qui-Appelle Eiver, cross the 
Qui-Appelle Lakes, and then descend the Qui-Appelle 
into Eed Eiver." In the proposal made, a waggon road 
is preferred, as the above statement is too insufficiently 
supported to act on. Still this water communication 
might be of some use in connection with freight. 

The navigation of the south branch of the Sascatche- 
wan is probably better than the north * ; if so, being in 
the direction required, it is preferable to the latter. As 
on this point uncertainty still exists, it is to be regretted 
that by the exploring parties engaged it was not thought 
necessary to launch a raft or boat, properly provided, at 
the western end, and by a proper examination extending 
to the Elbow, to remove or confirm existing doubts on 
the subject. It is also to be regretted that none of the 
many military engineers, who have within the last 
couple of years been sent to the Western colonies, and 
whose talents and education so preeminently qualify 
them to conduct such an investigation, their instructions 
taking them through American territory instead of 
across the mountains by the Hudson's Bay Company's 
trail (as Captain Palliser went), had an opportunity to 
examine the country on the passage outward. Captain 

* See note at end of chapter. 



SOUTH SASCATCHEWAN. 113 

Palliser, writing in September, of the south branch, in 
109° long., says, " This magnificent river rivals the Mis- 
souri in size and volume, and even at this, the lowest state 
of water during the whole year*, was navigable for craft of 
any size, as I found by sad experience, having been so 
unfortunate as to lose one of my waggons in the chan- 
nel of the river, at a depth of sixteen feet." In another 
place he says of the south branch, " We found it very 
deep in lat. 50° 55', our horses as well as ourselves being 
obliged to swim." Of the south branch, Sir G. Simp- 
son says, " It is of considerable size without any im- 
pediment of any moment, one-third of a mile in width 
at twenty miles above its junction with the north 
branch." " A smart ride of four or five hours brought 
the party, through a country very much resembling an 
English park, to the north branch in lat. 53°, long. 
108.° The Sascatchewan is here, observes Sir George 
Simpson, upwards of a quarter of a mile wide, present- 
ing, as its name implies, a swift current. It is navigable 
for boats from the Eocky Mountain passes in long. 116° 
to Lake Winnepeg, upwards of 700 miles in a straight 
line, but by the actual course of the stream nearly 
double that distance." From these remarks I infer that 
the volume of water in the south branch is greater and 
more lasting than in the north, an inference which is 
strengthened by examining their relative positions on 
the map. 

Mr. James M'Kay, an intelligent partner of the Hud- 
son's Bay Company, who is in charge of Fort Ellis, 
and from his long residence in the neighbourhood ought 
to be good authority, insists that both branches of the 

* Here the Captain is^evidently in error; the water is lowest 
early in spring. Rep. Sel. Com. H. B. C. 1857. No. 788. 

I 



114 RED DEER AND BATTLE RIVERS. 

Sascatchewan are as navigable as the Mississippi at St. 
Paul's, quite to the vicinity of the Eocky Mountains. 

From early in May until late in October *, the 
river would probably be navigable and full. There is dis- 
tinct evidence that on the southern branch there are 
" fewer rapids," if any, and long reaches wholly with- 
out rapids.f While we have evidence of the prevalence 
of curves in the north branch, and in the south branch 
from Elbow to its junction with the former ; as far as 
the south branch has been examined, from the Elbow 
towards the Eocky Mountains, it appears straight. J 

From the nature of the ground through which it passes, 
obstacles, if any, would consist of mud flats or sand- 
bars at sharp turns in the river, which might easily be 
removed by dredging, or the application of a little 
engineering skill. 

The absence of timber on the banks is a decided ad- 
vantage ; floating timber on a swift river, snags, and 
"sawyers," are exceedingly dangerous, troublesome, 
and expensive impediments to steam navigation. 

Fuel cannot be wanting : on Eed Deer Eiver a group 
of coal exists, in which three beds measure twenty 
feet, twelve of which is pure coal. At Souris Eiver 
coal is found, and at Edmonton in abundance ; but for 
a long time the steamers on the south branch would, 
no doubt, burn wood, taken down with a favourable 
current, from Eed Deer Eiver, which is navigable (Battle 
Eiver is not), or from some other point equally favour- 
able on the western side of the river to be navigated. § 

* Sub. Com. H. B. C, 1857, p. 49. 

t Sir G. Simpson, Ev. H. B. C, 1857, Nos. 778 and 788. ' 
J Parliamentary Papers, relating to Lake Superior and Red 
River Settlement, p. 151. 

§ In regard to transporting wood for fuel, as 1300 lbs. of coal 



SOURCE OF THE COLUMBIA. 115 

The route proposed would be quite near enough to 
the valuable agricultural land that borders on the north 
branch to answer as its outlet, and this remark will 
refer equally to the "rich soil so well adapted for 
pasture and agricultural purposes " so abundantly dis- 
tributed on the banks of Battle Eiver ; and we should 
not omit from the consideration the large district west 
of the Eocky Mountains, watered by the Columbia and 
its tributary, the M'Gillivray or Flatbow Eiver. It 
is estimated at 20,000 square miles, and has been de- 
scribed in enthusiastic terms by the Catholic Bishop 
of Oregon, De Smet in his Oregon missions. The ter- 
ritory of the Kootonais Indians would seem, from his 
glowing description, to be divided in favourable propor- 
tions between forests and prairies. Of timber, he names 
birch, pines, cedar, and cypress ; speaks of specimens of 
coal, and " great quantities of lead," apparently mixed 
with silver.* The source of the Columbia seemed to im- 
press him as a very important point. He observes that 
the climate is delightful, extremes of heat and cold seldom 
known, the snow disappearing as it falls. He reiterates 
the opinion that the advantages nature seems to have 
bestowed on the source of the Columbia, will render its 
geographical position very important some day, and 
that the magic hand of civilised man would transform 
it into a terrestrial paradise ; that it can be reached in 
waggons from Salt Lake City, along the western base 
of the Eocky Mountains ; and that Brigham Young 
proposed to lead his next Mormon exodus to the source 
of the Columbia river : considered in connection with 

make as much steam as 4500 lbs. of wood (if pine), coal can be 
with economy transported three and a half times as far as wood, 
other considerations being balanced. 

* An ore similar perhaps to that at Washoe. 

i 2 



116 VEKMILION PASS TO HOPETOWN. 

the Mormon establishment, a sort of half-way post on 
the Salmon Eiver, a branch of the Columbia, it seems 
not impossible that such amove may have been con- 
templated by the Mormons.* 

That a good road can be made from Vermilion 
Pass to Colville has been already shown ; that a road 
equally favourable can be found south-westward to 
Hopetown, will appear probable from the following 
remark of Dr. Hector ; that looking from the pass 
across Brisco range, from south-west to south, moun- 
tains are not seen, "so that if any portion of that 
country is occupied by any, they must be of very 
inferior altitude." Mountains do intervene, but not in 
unbroken ranges, and the road would have to be 
traced through the valleys of the Flatbow, Arrow, and 
Okanagan lakes, successively to that of the Similka- 
meen Eiver, and thence to Hopetown. What is 
known of this road is excellent, with the exception of 
the crossing at Manson's Mountain, twelve miles from 
Hope, which (I had no means of measuring it) to 
me did not appear more than 1800 feet or so high ; 
but all the country in the immediate neighbourhood of 
it looks so broken, that I have no doubt, when pro- 
perly looked for, a better crossing in the range to 
which this mountain belongs will be found. The 
valley of the Similkameen and Flatbow rivers are 
known to be fertile, and to abound with excellent 
pasture. The Okanagan and Arrow valleys will, I 
apprehend, be found more rugged, but by no means 
formidably so. 

* Vide Report Sel. Com.: Leg. Minnesota, 1858. 



CLIMATE. 117 



Climate of proposed Route. 

As some very erroneous impressions regarding the 
climate of the different localities through which the 
proposed line must pass prevail, I may be excused for 
making the following remarks. It is commonly said 
that in point of temperature, in North America, the 
same effect is experienced by travelling through 1° of 
long, westward as by travelling through 1° of lat, 
southward. This is manifestly an exaggeration ; still it 
is a fact that, as we move westward, the climate 
becomes milder, and the average annual temperature is 
increased. This increase of temperature, in the region 
we are speaking of, on the same latitude, amounts 
probably from side to side of the continent, to 15° 
Fahr.*, an effect, perhaps, produced by the summer 
winds of the Pacific, which blow almost constantly 
from west or north-west, wafting warmth and moisture 
through the passes of the rocky chain. But whatever 
the cause, the fact is certain ; the south part of Van- 
couver Island, for instance, having a climate much 
milder than in England, is a hundred miles north of 
Quebec. An isothermal f line drawn across the con- 
tinent would, of course, be far from straight, but the 
general obliquity of such a line may be judged of in 
this way :— If such a line were drawn from New York 
it would pass through Lake Winnepeg to Fort Simp- 
son ; in other words, if New York were, with respect to 
latitude, similarly placed on the west coast, Fort Simp- 
son, a thousand miles north of it, would enjoy a tempe- 

* Sir John Richardson makes this 20° Fahr. 
•f Vide Physical Geography, Maury, Plate VIII. 
i 3 



118 CLIMATE. 

rature equally favourable with it. Mr. Blodget^ who has 
published an extensive work on the climatology of the 
United States, remarks that nine-tenths of European 
Eussia, — the main seat of population and resources 
— is farther north than St. Paul ; that, in fact, Pem- 
bina is the climatic equivalent of Moscow, and for that 
of St. Petersburg (which is in 60° north), we may rea- 
sonably go to lat. 55° on the American continent. Like 
European Eussia, also, the Sascatchewan district has a 
climate of extremes, the thermometer having a wide 
range ; but it is well understood that the growth of 
the cereals and of the most useful vegetables depends 
chiefly on the intensity and duration of the summer 
heats, and is comparatively little influenced by the 
severity of winter cold, or lowness of the mean tempe- 
rature during the year. Therefore, it is important to 
observe that the northern shore of Lake Huron has the 
mean summer heat of Bordeaux, in Southern Prance, 
namely 70° Fahr., while Cumberland House, in lat. 54°, 
long. 102, on the Sascatchewan, exceeds, in this re- 
spect, Brussels and Paris. The United States Army 
Meteorological Eegister has ascertained that the line of 
70° mean summer heat crosses the Hudson Eiver at 
West Point, thence descends to the latitude of Pitts- 
burg, but westward is traced through Sandusky, 
Chicago, Fort Snelhng, and Fort Union, into British 
America. " It is warmer," he says, " at Fort Benton 
on the Missouri, in long. 110^° west, and lat. 47^° north 
for every season, than at St. Paul, Minnesota. The 
mean winter temperature at Fort Benton is 25°, and 
the same as that of Chicago, Toronto, Albany, and 
Portland, Maine. At St. Paul it is but 15° or 10° less. 
It is not so cold as this on the main (south) branch of 
the Sascatchewan." 



CLIMATE. 119 

Allowing the 15° Fahr. before mentioned; considering 
1° lat. south equal to 1° Fahr. ; also, as usual, 300 feet 
of altitude equal to 1° Fahr. ; the average climate of the 
Vermihon Pass would probably resemble that of 
Moose or York factories in the southern part of 
Hudson's Bay, of which Dr. Eae* says the summer 
there extends from early in June to early in November, 
five months. Mr. A. C. Anderson's opinion on this 
subject, from his long residence in the country, is entitled 
to attention : of the Upper Fraser he says : — 

" The regular freshets begin at the latter end of 
April, and last during May and June. About the 15th 
of June may be regarded as the culminating point ; and 
by the middle of July the waters are generally greatly 
subsided. There is rarely a freshet of much conse- 
quence at any other season ; but this sometimes happens, 
and I have known a sudden freshet from heavy rains, 
in October, raise the river beyond the summer limit. 

" Snow begins to fall in the mountains early in October. 
In July there is still snow for a short distance on the 
summit of the Fort Hope trail, but not to impede the 
passage of horses. From the middle of October, how- 
ever, to the middle of June, this track is not to be 
depended upon for transport with pack animals. 

"The summer climate about the Forks is dry, and the 
heat is great. During winter, the thermometer indicates 
occasionally from 20° to 30° of cold below zero of 
Fahrenheit ; but such severe cold seldom lasts on the 
upper parts of Fraser's Eiver for more than three days ; 
the thermometer will then continue to fluctuate between 
zero and the freezing point, until, possibly, another 
interval of cold arrives. 

"But the winters are extremely capricious throughout 

* Ev. H. B. C. Affairs, 1857, No. 435. 
i 4 



120 CLIMATE. 

these regions, and no two resemble each other very 
closely. In general the snow does not fall deep enough 
along the banks of the main streams to preclude winter 
travelling with pack animals. The quality of the pas- 
ture is such (a kind of bunch grass in most places) that 
animals feed well at all seasons. There are many spots 
between the Similikameen Valley and Okanagan that 
are specially favourable for winter ranches. In some 
the snow never lies, however deep it may be around." 

Mr. John Miles, on May 1st, found the Sascatchewan 
country completely free from snow, and the river very 
fall of water.* 

Of a climate known to be capricious, whether we com- 
pare seasons or localities, it is of course impossible to 
speak with certainty ; but, we have evidence enough to 
justify the inference that Vermilion Pass would be open at 
least five or six months, (perhaps seven) out of the twelve, 
and the remaining portions of the route much longer. 

One peculiarity of the climate of the country it re- 
quires in England an effort to realise. Surrounded by 
snowy peaks, the air is often not only warm but sultry. 
Even at Victoria, where snow seldom exceeds a few 
inches, or Langley, we have evidence of this every day. 
The snow itself is not of the damp, compact nature 
we are accustomed to, it is light, dry, and drifting ; on 
this account, when it does come to thaw, it disappears 
with astonishing rapidity, f 

The annexed data extracted from the reports of the. 
Secretary of War, U. S., 1853 — 1854, record some 
particularly interesting facts on this point. 

* Ev. H. B. C. Affairs, No. 4684. Jan. 9th, 1858, " Little or no 
snow on the ground " from Edmonton to Rocky Mountain House, 
Explor. British North America, p. 25. 

| Vide also Par. Rail. Report, vol. i. p. 47. 



CLIMATE. 121 

Mr. Pinkliam crossed the mountains from Walla- Walla 
to Seattle, by the Yakima pass, the summit of which he 
crossed on the 21st of January. For about six miles on 
the summit, the snow was found to vary from 4 ft. to 
6 ft. in depth — occasionally 7 ft. The area covered 
by snow exceeding 12 in., in depth, was somewhat 
less than 70 miles ; of this 45 miles were 2 ft. 
and upwards ; 20 miles were 4 ft. and upwards ; and 
5 miles were 6 ft. and upwards. All the snow was 
light and dry; it was the accumulated snows of the 
winter to January 21st ; deposited in successive layers 
of 2 in. to 2 ft., which have generally lain undisturbed 
since their fall, and they present little obstruction to 
removal in comparison with the compact drifted snows 
of the Atlantic states. The winter and spring tempera- 
ture of the Yakima pass, 3000 — 4000 ft. elevation, are 
given as follows :— Nov. 36° ; Dec. 28°; Jan. 28°; Feb. 
30°; March 31°; April 38°. The mean temperature 
at Puget Sound, from observations extending over four 
years, is exactly 10° higher than these ; at the Sound 
the whiter rain is 20*6 in., and since more rain usually 
falls in the neighbourhood of mountains than on plains, 
and snow occupies from ten to twelve times the bulk of 
an equal quantity of rain, it is probable that the accu- 
mulated snows of winter, in the Vermilion Pass, would 
exceed twenty or twenty-one feet, but that the pass 
would frequently be open in December and passable in 
May. 

There was no necessity to consider, in connection 
with the foregoing statements, any questions connected 
with unextinguished claims of the Hudson's Bay Com- 
pany to the lands required. First, because the Directors 
have distinctly stated, that they are already prepared 
to recommend to the shareholders of the Company to 



122 TRADE WITH THE ASIATIC CONTINENT. 

cede any lands which may be required for such purposes ; 
and, that the terms of such cessions would be a matter 
of no difficulty between Her Majesty's Govermnent and 
the Company * : but principally because it is clearly to 
the interest of the Hudson's Bay Company to co-operate 
with and promote any plan of colonisation, the onus and 
responsibility of which is not imposed upon them ; since 
any such plan, if carried into execution, must raise im- 
mensely the value of the improved lands adjoining 
their numerous forts, the legal title to which, it may 
be conjectured, would be confirmed to them. 

In relation to China, Japan, and Australia. 

I before mentioned my doubts of the trade of the 
Asiatic continent with England being carried, over the 
line, if constructed. But there can be little doubt that 
if Victoria should become a depot of English goods, 
trade with China must result, and the island become in 
this respect a. " half-way house." Its geographical posi- 
tion is more commanding than even that of San Fran- 
cisco. Eecollecting that in the North Pacific the 
westerly monsoons blow strongest all the summer 
north of 45°, and that, during the same period, the 
north-east tradewinds south of the Sandwich Islands, 
and the calms of Cancer in the latitudes of Shanghae 
and Canton, prevail ; and that in a straight line China 
may be said to be equidistant from Vancouver Island 
and San Francisco ; a steamer from the island would 
reach Canton in about the same time as from San 
Francisco, — say forty or forty-two days ; a sailing ship 
from the latter would be five or six days in advance ; but 

* Vide Papers relative to the H. B. C.'s Charter and Licence of 
Trade in April 1859, pp. 15 and 1C. 



POSTAL COMMUNICATION WITH AUSTRALIA. 123 

since, on the return voyage, in either case a vessel must 
keep so far to the north ; while the average passage 
from Hong Kong to San Francisco is fifty-five days, it 
would not exceed forty days to Vancouver Island. 

The overland route suggested involves, however, a 
consideration of even far greater magnitude than the 
foregoing. I allude to the increased rapidity of postal 
communication between England and the Australian 
colonies. In transmitting intelligence, to or from, the 
saving of time, compared with that now required, 
would not fall far short of a month. Vancouver 
Island is nearer to Sydney by 900 miles than Pa- 
nama is, which any one can test with a map and 
compass. In November last (30th November 1859), 
the legislative council of New South Wales unani- 
mously resolved " that the house continuing to maintain 
its opinion on this unfortunate subject, in which 
it considers the future interests of this colony are 
deeply involved, will not entertain any question in 
regard to a postal subsidy, which shall ignore the 
deliberate conviction respecting the Panama route, to 
which this branch of the legislature gave expression in 
February last ; and at the same time expresses its readi- 
ness to concur in fulfilling any obligations devolving 
upon this colony, so long as it is compelled to avail 
itself of the existing arrangements." Would not the 
proposed route, if executed, remove this difficulty, 
and happily unite all the colonies so disconnected at 
present ? As Judge Haliburton, on a similar subject, re- 
marked, " Here is the bundle of sticks ; all they want is 
to be properly united." If, as anticipated in the depth 
of winter, the overland route should be interrupted, 
the connecting steamers could, during the interval, run 
to Panama. 



124 POSTAL SUBSIDIES. 



Conclusions arrived at. 



From a perusal of the facts stated in this and the 
foregoing chapter, and bearing in mind that the trade 
of the West Indies is a declining one, and that of the 
North Pacific Colonies is every day more promising ; 
that from London, the West Indies and Panama, can 
be reached as quickly, via Halifax, Portland, or New 
York, as at present by the Eoyal Mail line of steamers ; 
that the commerce of England with North America, 
generally steadily increasing, is more than double that 
of the West Indies, Central and South America, put 
together ; — the following very important conclusions 
will, I think, be drawn, that, if the northern route 
through British territory can be opened as easily as 
described ; and if a line of steamers were encouraged 
to run between the Australian Colonies and Vancouver 
Island, while the land route might be open, and the 
same steamers were to run between Australia and 
Panama in winter ; and if one of the lines of steamers 
at present subsidised to Canada or the States, were 
extended to Aspinwall*, the postal subsidy of 238,500/. 
per annum to the Eoyal Mail line, might be dispensed 
with without injury to any existing interest ; and the 
steamers themselves, if withdrawn, would not be 
missed ; the postal subsidy of 135,000/. to Australia, 
via Malta, Alexandria, Suez, and Ceylon, applied to 
the shorter Pacific route ; and, if that portion of the 
subsidy of 122,625/. to Alexandria, Calcutta, and China, 
which applies to China only, were withdrawn, and ap- 
plied to encouraging a line of steamers from Vancouver 

* £14,700 per arm. is paid to the Cunard line for extension to 
Bermuda and St. Thomas. • 



INFERENCE. 125 

Island to China, British commerce would benefit im- 
mensely by the change ; the colonies of Great Britain 
in North America would be united, rendered accessible, 
and their trade developed ; a great saving to the 
nation at large, and in the million which is annually 
expended in postal subsidies, by England, would be 
effected ; and it is even highly probable, that the 
interests of large steam companies, which, at first sight, 
would appear to suffer, might benefit from a change 
which could, after all, be to a great extent accomplished 
by a transfer of steamers from one path on the ocean 
to another. 



P.S. Since the foregoing was written, it is reported that Captain 
Palliser has examined the course of the South Saskatchewan river, 
and has ascertained that it is not so straight as was conjectured ; 
that it forms a deep loop or southerly bend between 110° "W*. long, 
and 113°. If so, an alteration in the detail of the proposed route 
might be required : more land travel and less by water. 

It is also said that the south branch is more divided than the 
north branch at equal distances from the mountains ; it does not, 
however, follow from this, that the main stream of the former, its 
lower level being taken into account, may not contain a greater body 
of water than the latter. The principal objection to using the north 
branch as the thoroughfare from west to east is its indirectness, 
adding 300 miles to the entire distance. 

Traversing, as the north branch does, a country fertile and available 
for early settlement, which a considerable portion of the south branch 
does not, steamers would no doubt soon be placed upon the former 
as a consequence of the occupation of the country, which the opening 
of the more direct communication must occasion. 

Laden batteaux, or light canoes, may pass the grand rapids in 
safety, but these oppose a serious barrier to the more northerly 
navigation, as it would be premature to talk of the construction of 
two or three miles of expensive canals and locks, besides which an 
accumulation of ice often obstructs the navigation at the head of 



126 NOTE. 

Lake Winnepeg for weeks after the rivers that flow into it are 
free. 

It is true that light carts have frequently passed between Red 
River and Edmonton, but as the whole country is well adapted to 
the construction of waggon roads, this circumstance alone should 
have little weight in determining a preference for one route over 
another. 

Whatever route may be adopted, it should be recollected that in 
this country, while navigation is uncertain before the 1st of May and 
later than 31st of October, traffic on roads would be a certainty for a 
longer period of the year. 



IV. 







1-27 



CHAP. VIII. 



SOCIETY IN THE COLONIES. 



It is fortunate for these colonies that notices of the 
society, which an emigrant or tourist may expect to 
meet with in them, are rare. Such as have found 
their way into print present anything but a flattering 
picture or exalted idea of the social elements of the 
place. The following passage, for instance, occurs in 
a book already referred to : — 

" Of small birds, there is the Mexican woodpecker, 
and a large mis-shapen species of bullfinch — note it 
has none ; and indeed aves vocales may, generally 
speaking, be said never to be met with on the west 
coast of .America. The settler in these parts misses 
equally the lively carol of the lark, the sweet cheerful 
note of the thrush, and the melancholy melody of the 
nightingale ; still more will he of gentle mind, as he 
wends his solitary way through these distant wilds, 
feel impelled to hanker after the pleasures of society, 
and to long for the charm of conversation with the fair 
daughters of his country." 

To classify ladies with birds, singing birds especially, 
is at once novel and poetical. In this light, for the 
rosy robin, the gentle dove, the musical linnet, (but 
never for the mis-shapen bullfinch,) unfeathered repre- 
sentatives might easily be conceived. Indeed the sugges- 
tion will naturally occur that, instead of the very limited 
number of birds now worn in hats, a dive into natural 




Hiurri.sn kmkhiantand 
BJJBTE 



.uu-rn i-.\ciric i-i'T.i.^-i i-;.s. 



128 A NEWSPAPER CONCEPTION OF A GOLDEN AGE. 

history would lead to the number being vastly ex- 
tended : the bird worn could be emblematic of the 
wearer, and a new and very beautiful system of femi- 
nine heraldry result. But the fact that the category 
commences with small birds is sufficient to show, 
modern fashions being taken into account, that the 
allegory was written some years ago. This must have 
been the case, for at the present time (although when 
away from the settlements one must not expect to 
meet ladies, like so many Moseses, in the bush) society 
in the colonies will, in this respect, compare favourably 
with that of any locality in Great Britain where the 
numbers are on a par. Nor is the place so intolerably 
dull as it's painted ; for in this, as in most other 
colonies, Philharmonic concerts, balls, theatricals, and 
social entertainments of a quieter character, are not 
neglected. 

The next notice taken of the society of the place 
occurs in the Illustrated London News, the pictures 
in which, as in this instance, do not always remind 
one of the originals : in it (March 12th, 1859) the 
Editor characterises the population as " the offscourings 
of the civilised world ; " the place as " bereft of the 
humblest needs of existence ; " and the v Indians as 
" savages of the lowest types of humanity." The an- 
nexed statement of the able Judge of British Columbia, 
extracted from a recent and interesting letter of The 
Times' Correspondent, places this matter in a very 
different light. 

The Judge writes : — - 

" It is a legitimate subject of no small congratulation 
that in a country so wild and almost pathless (certainly 
roadless) as this, with a population generally pointed 
at as the refuse of California — with a magistracy weak 



A CALENDAR OF CRIME. ]29 

in numbers, weaker in their great inexperience, from 
the judge downwards, every one of them new to 
judicial and magisterial business — with a police never 
twenty in number, and never more than four or five 
in one place — the population all armed, and all en- 
gaged in the most exciting and demoralizing pursuit 
which man can follow (namely, gold-hunting) — there 
should have been in the whole of the present (now 
last) year not one murder, not one attempted murder, 
not one duel, and but one assault with a deadly weapon 
at all in the whole of British Columbia. Under Pro- 
vidence, this wonderful result, unexampled in the 
history of new gold-mining countries, has been without 
doubt produced by the firmness of the Governor, and 
the unhesitating sternness with which one or two ' dif- 
ficulties ' which occurred at the close of the past year 
had been met and punished. It has been thoroughly 
impressed upon our whole population that the cowardly 
and ruffianly outrages perpetrated to so lamentable an 
extent elsewhere, under the above euphonism, will 
here consign the offenders without the hope of mercy 
to the gallows, or a life-long imprisonment." 

The Judge remarks with reasonable pride that 
Blackstone is more regarded in his jurisdiction than 
Judge Lynch ; and while he draws an accurate and 
just comparison between " the statistics of blood " on 
the south and those on the north side of the 49th 
deg. of north latitude favourable to the latter, yet he 
does ample justice to the Cahfornians who have come 
to British Columbia. Of them he reports that they 
have always — " Manifested a great desire to see justice 
fairly done, and great patience with the difficulties 
which the magistrates and the judiciary have had to 
contend with. I have frequently complimented my 



130 COLONIAL PRIVATIONS. 

rough auditory — sometimes 150 miners — on the good 
order and manly respect observed in my court.'' 

As a class, the miners of British Columbia have a 
much worse character than they deserve. Generally 
speaking, they are not only civil and sober in their 
habits, but well read and intelligent. On their first 
arrival in the country, however, they were accom- 
panied with the usual proportion of gamblers and "Kow- 
dies ; " but for these, the place was soon made anything 
but a desirable residence by the firm and uncompro- 
mising attitude of the British authorities. The fact 
is, it would be as unfair to identify the miners with 
the black-legs who follow them as it would be to 
class the British army with the suttlers who hang* 
about the camp. 

Again, it is rather difficult to attach a definite mean- 
ing to the expression, " humblest needs of existence," 
of which the people are bereft ; beef and mutton, and 
fish and game, milk and vegetables, appear to be 
within the reach of the poorest — the native fruits of 
the country make excellent pastry. The best teas at 
Is. and Is. M. per lb. find their way, vid Sandwich 
Islands, from China. Wines round the Horn and cigars 
from Manilla pay no duty. English fruits are grown, 
and those of the tropics imported. Grapes are Is. per 
pound. Every restaurant prints an elaborate bill of 
fare. There is no want of public baths. Saddle-horses 
can be hired, and vehicles to drive about in. The 
blacks make excellent cooks. The editor must have 
had an uncomfortable dream. 

Again, these Indians are far from being the lowest 
types of humanity, notwithstanding their moral de- 

* Or rather, who ought to be hanged. 



INDIANS. 131 

gradation, where visited by the whites. On the con- 
trary, many of them are remarkably good looking, 
with aquiline features — make useful servants — are 
sometimes strictly honest to their employers only — can 
plough and drive oxen — are exceedingly hospitable in 
their own homes, and teachable when dwelling amongst 
the whites ; they lack neither courage nor intelligence. 
Some are exceedingly ingenious. One Indian made 
a ring for me out of a five-dollar piece, and in it set 
the stone ; and the workmanship of the whole was 
perfect. 

I have known an Indian stock a gun, making the 
ramrod and screw at the end of it, the fitting and finish 
of the whole being unexceptionable. They weave 
blankets, carve their own pipes, construct canoes, and 
raise enormous weights in the construction of their 
dwellings. They are eminently commercial, and can 
quickly understand the intricacies of a tariff; give a 
pencil and sheet of paper to an Indian, and he can 
generally make a rude map of a country he has travelled 
through. As guides, fishermen, and hunters they are 
extremely useful. In the same tribe intermarriage is 
generally prohibited, and to prevent war between tribes 
they have a law that relationship follows on the 
mother's side. The wealth of each is periodically dis- 
tributed for the benefit of all ; they scorn to profit by 
the leavings of the dead, and bear pain heroically. 

By the way, who are the Aborigines Protection 
Society ? The Blue Books of 1858 teem with excellent 
advice and pathetic appeals from them to Secretaries of 
State and Governors of Colonies, on behalf of the red 
man, illustrated with dissertations on the feuds of the 
Gryphons and Arimaspians, whoever they were, and 
the faults of the treaty made by William Penn. The 

K 2 



132 ABORIGINES PROTECTION SOCIETY. 

fireside newspapers report their meetings and their 
views ; but does the Society, ever by raising subscrip- 
tions, send out persons to give vitality abroad to the 
admirable doctrines which they inculcate at home ? It 
is unreasonable to suppose that the high officers of the 
crown should undertake duties that ought to devolve 
upon the benevolent community at large, and such as 
are usually accomplished by general opinion acting upon 
private enterprise. 

In both colonies there are said to be some 80,000 
Indians, and wherever the whites have been brought 
into contact with them, steamers and rockers have 
banished the fish, and hunters for market the game ; 
spirits are traded in the camps, disease and famine have 
thinned their numbers, and whole tribes have been re- 
duced to immorality and want. 

From England one missionary only, the indefatigable 
Duncan, has appeared among them as an instructor, (the 
efforts of the priests being directed rather to their spiri- 
tual than to their intellectual necessities,) but even lie 
has shown that Indians are eminently capable of being 
taught. It is hopeless to expect that the Bishop can do 
much to ameliorate their condition ; the moral and in- 
tellectual wants of the European population are quite 
enough to absorb his attention. 

The Bishop of British Columbia is said to have been 
singularly successful in achieving the influential position 
which ought to belong to his office, by instituting edu- 
cational establishments, founding a collegiate school, a 
want previously much felt, and by otherwise energeti- 
cally promoting the moral and social welfare of the 
inhabitants immediately upon his arrival. This success 
is the more signal because but a short time before 
considerable outcry was raised in the colony against 



THE CHUECH. 133 

anything bordering upon a state church. The local 
newspapers declaimed against it, and the House of 
Eepresentatives passed resolutions opposing it. The 
very title of bishop seemed a serious impediment to his 
success. It is impossible not to admire the tact and 
judgment with which he met and overcame those diffi- 
culties, and literally, if I may be allowed to use the term, 
" turned the tables," converting those who would have 
otherwise ranked as opponents into supporters of the 
church of the most useful kind, by informing them that 
he asked for no assistance from the state ; that his was 
the voluntary system ; and that therefore he was pre- 
pared to receive contributions in support of the church, 
from all who were opposed to its receiving assistance 
from the state. 

The latest advices show that the Celestials are rapidly 
finding their way into British Columbia. If in Cali- 
fornia, where undisguised antipathy to the race has 
always existed, where special enactments have been 
framed to expel them, and where they have been for 
years the victims of organised or casual oppression, 
their numbers increased from 15,000 in 1855 to 50,000 
in 1860 ; it may be conjectured that the influx of them 
to the gold fields of British Columbia, where they are 
certain, in common with all foreigners, to meet with 
protection as well as toleration, from California and 
China direct, will be remarkable. In California they 
are disliked, because they are regarded as a people 
who tell fearfully on the surface digging of the country, 
who extract large quantities of gold, and who, living 
as they do on a handful of rice and a few nondescripts, 
and ultimately carrying back with them to China the 
wealth which their matchless industry has enabled 
them to acquire, are in reality detrimental to the 

K 3 



134 CHINESE. 

country. To them a month's wages in China is not 
more than the ordinary wages of a labourer for one 
day in British Columbia. An experiment was tried 
some years ago, to test the practicability of importing 
Chinamen as labourers into Cuba, and found successful. 
There 600 of them were apprenticed at $4 per month. 
A British merchant, settled at Amoy, describes the 
scene of despatching a vessel with 400 labourers, at 
$3 per month and rations to Honolulu as follows : " The 
only sorrowful persons were those whom from disease 
or deformity we were compelled to reject. These we 
placed a distinguishing mark upon, but this they re- 
moved, and presented themselves for selection three or 
four times. We were obliged to send them from 
alongside in hundreds ; and the last day, so great was 
the rush, that we thought they would have taken the 
vessel from us." 

The Chinese are adepts in the art of washing clothes, 
and monopolise that business wherever they go. 

With the Indians they appear to get on well, having 
many points in common ; foremost among which may 
be reckoned immorality, and absence of cleanliness in 
their dwellings. I do not know whether or not they 
are such inveterate gamblers among themselves as 
Indians are. 

See Appendix, page 170. 



135 



CHAP. IX. 

A FEW SUGGESTIONS TO DIFFERENT CLASSES OF INTENDING 
EMIGRANTS. 

Persons emigrating frequently form too high antici- 
pations of becoming suddenly wealthy, and therefore 
become too soon disappointed ; and some who, from 
some cause or other, do not carry with them the 
elements of success, reason thus : that because they 
have failed in everything they undertook at home, the 
time has come to repair their fortunes abroad. Never 
was there a greater fallacy. They forget, that of any 
family with whom they are acquainted, the members 
who have emigrated are the boldest and the most enter- 
prising ; that from home " the stronger sex, the stronger 
age, the stronger hands, the stronger will, are ever 
flying ; " and they are, therefore, on their arrival in the 
colony, disappointed to find superior competitive talent 
in every walk of life. 

Of the former class, the best illustration I can give is 
to select, almost at random, one from a bundle of 
letters from enquiring emigrants, which will convince 
any indifferent person, that the caution is not misplaced. 
The following is an extract : — 

" Dear Sir, — Confident that you will do for me the 
best you can, it is, I know, almost idle for me to specify 
any particulars as regards my own views ; but I may 
mention, I would of course like to get a spot of land as 

X 4 



136 GOVERNMENT OFFICES. 

near as possible to the site of a new town, near a good 
harbour, or on a good river, where trade would be 
likely to be actively carried on ; and having a taste for 
beauty in scenery, and delighting, as well as all my 
family, in the sea, I would, if practicable, like to have 
with approximation to the sea, beauty in scenery, a 
place having a constant supply of fresh water, well 
wooded, lying well to the south aspect, with land of 
good quality, having shelter from any prevailing winds, 
free of marsh or swamp, having a limestone or other 
quarry upon it, whereby building materials could easily 
be got ; but there are many, many other advantages 
which you might see, which would outbalance any 
ideas or suggestions of mine, such as a coal mine, a 
good mill site with good water power, which in a 
new country is not a bad speculation ; building ground 
or the probable site of a ship's quay, or a locality 
where a town is likely to spring up. . . My fortune 
would be made in a short time, &c. 

" I have, &c. 

ct * * * » 

The writer will not be angry with me, I am sure, for 
publishing a portion of a letter which affords no clue 
to his identity ; particularly as, knowing him to be 
both talented and deserving, in doing so I express a 
sincere wish that he may become possessed of the quay 
and the coal mine too. 

I shall here take the liberty of addressing a few 
remarks to the different classes of persons likely to 
contemplate emigration. 

First, persons seeking government offices, and whose 
names are written down on lists, are very numerous in 
the colony. The salaries are generally inadequately 



PROFESSION. 137 

low. With such an object in view, I would recom- 
mend any one not to emigrate until he had first 
procured an appointment to whatever office he might 
be in quest of. 

All the professions are overstocked ; this, of course, 
includes the bar, the church, engineers and surveyors, 
&c. Private tutors, governesses, and anybody that 
can teach any thing would do remarkably well in the 
country. 

I am not aware of there being any ladies' school in 
the island, — a want much felt. 

Artists are seldom met with, It seems strange that 
it does not occur to some enterprising publisher in 
England, to commission an artist, so as to reproduce in 
England some of the majestic views of the country. 
Those published by Dickenson and Co., New Bond 
Street, and one of Victoria, by Day and Son*, all which 
are very true and characteristic, are the only views I 
have seen. If it pays newspapers to depute special 
correspondents, seedsmen to employ collectors, &c, 
why should not art pay also ? Let us hope that some 
of the talent so assiduously expended on the Cam and 
Isis may yet find a profitable vent abroad. Eichmond 
is very beautiful, but rather confined and flat ; it only 
wants the cascades in the foreground, and Mount Hood 
or Mount Browne glittering in the distance, to make 
a picture of it. 

To capitalists these colonies offer the greatest induce- 
ments. As a rule, the newer the colony the higher is 
the rate of interest, and the more numerous the open- 
ings for investment. For instance, a good brewery 
would succeed" well, judging by the immense consump- 

* Lithographers to the Queen, Gate Street, Lincoln's Inn. 



138 FARMERS. 

tion of bottled ale and stout in the colony. Hops 
thrive remarkably well. Many of the productions of 
the country might be traded in with advantage ; such 
as timber, salmon pickling, oils, bear's grease, large 
quills, hemp, porpoise leather, deer horns, skins, &c. 

Money in Vancouver Island can be lent on good 
security, at rates ranging from 25 to 30 per cent, 
per annum ; and the opportunities for investment 
are so varied, and the field so immense, that I should 
altogether exceed limits allotted in attempting to 
specify. 

The admirable openings that exist for farmers with 
small capital in Vancouver Island and in British Co- 
lumbia, will appear evident from a perusal of the 
foregoing pages. 

Assisted by every circumstance which at home 
would be an encumbrance or an impediment, with a 
market close at hand, and high prices for every thing 
he can produce, the farmer's prospects are extremely 
promising ; and, in consequence of the dearness of 
labour in every department, the larger his family the 
wealthier he is. There is nothing to deter a farmer 
in- the fact that the extent of prairie land is small com- 
pared with that occupied by forest, lake, and mountain. 
At the present time there is abundance of open land in 
both colonies not taken up. If there is a preponderance 
of timbered and waste land, compared with land ready 
for the plough, this condition must make the latter all 
the more valuable, as population, and with it the 
demand for land, increases. So that, regarded in a 
self-interested light only, the less the good land the 
better for the farmer, provided he loses no time in 
taking advantage of the very liberal land regulations 
recently adopted ; otherwise, every season of postpone- 



EATES OF LABOUR. 



139 



merit must inevitably, on his arrival, push him farther 
from the chief towns and settlements. 

As the rates of labour are of course regulated by 
those of San Francisco, the annexed schedule, taken 
from the Mercantile Gazette, San Francisco, Jan. 4th, 
1860, is here appended. 



EATES OP LABOUR IN SAN FKANCISCO. 



Blacksmiths, per diem 

Do. helpers, „ . . 2§ 
Brass founders, „ . .3 
Boiler makers, „ . .4 
Boat builders, „ . .5 
Ballast men, „ . . 2\ 
Bricklayers, „ . .5 

Bookbinders, „ . • 3§ 

Do. Folders, „ . .2 
Brickmakers, per month . 40 
Brickburners, „ .50 

Bakers, „ . 40 

Barbers, „ .50 

Butchers, „ . 60 

Che^esemakers, „ .35 

Choppers, „ . 35 

Coachmen, „ . 35 

Coppersmiths, per diem . 4 
Carpenters, „ . 4| 

Do. Ship, „ . 5 

Caulkers, „ . 5 

Carriage makers, „ . 2§ 

Coopers, „ . 2| 

Cartmen, „ . 2| 

Chasers, „ . 7 

Cooks, per month . 35 
Coal-hearers T „ 
Chambermaids, „ .25 

Day labourers, per diem 2 
Deck hands, (riv. nav.) 

per month, . 40 
Draymen, „ . 50 

Engineers, „ .75 

Polishers, per diem . 2 

Freestone cutters, „ . 4 
.Firemen, per month . 50 
Gardeners, „ .35 

Granite dressers, per diem 2\ 
Hodmen, „ . 2 

Hatters, per week, . 25 
Harness makers, per diem 2 
Hostlers, per month . 30 
Jewellers, per diem . 5 
Locksmiths, „ . 4 

Limeburners, per month . 40 



Dollars. 
4 

to 



3 

4 

5 

6 

3 

7 

6 

3 
75 
75 
75 
100 
100 
75 
60 
50 

5 

5 

6 

6 

4 

3§ 

H 

10 
80 
75 
30 
3 

50 

75 

150 

3 

60 
60 

H 
3 

40 
4 

50 



50 



35 
5 

3| 
3| 
4 



Lapidaries, per diem 
Lumbermen, per month 
Millwrights, per diem 
Metal turners, „ 
Machinists, „ 

Moulders, „ 

Marble cutters and polishers 
per diem, . 2 
Millers, „ . 4 

Mattress makers „ . 5 
Mates of vessels, per month 50 
Mill sawyers and planers 
per month , 
Plumbers, per diem 
Pump makers, „ 
Pile drivers, „ 
Painters, house, „ 

Do. sign, gold, per ft. 

Do. do. plain, „ 
Pilots, per month , 

Porters, „ 

Printers, per 1000 ems 
Riggers, per diem 
Shipsmiths, „ 

Do. helpers, „ 
Sailmakers, „ 

Stevedors, „ 

Stonemasons, „ 
Shoemakers, „ 
Stewards, per month 
Seamen, „ 

Seamen, coastwise, do. 
Shoemakers, per month 
Servant girls. 



Dollars. 
5 to 8 



50 

7 



Tin-workers, 
Tin-roofers 
Tanners and 



per diem 



Curriers* 
month 
Tailors, per diem 
Upholsterers „ 
Woodsawyers, „ 
Wheelwrights, „ 
Watchmakers, „ 
Waiters, per month 



. 20 
. 4 
. 3 
per 
. 40 
. 3 
. 5 

• n 

. 4 
. 5 
. 25 



4i 

4i 

5 

4 
6 



75 
6 
4i 



60c 

45c 

150 

100 

75c 

5 

5 

4 

6 

5 

5 

3 

80 

30 
80 
35 



75 
5 



50 



140 DOMESTIC SERVANTS. 

I presume labour is dearer on the north-west Pacific 
coast than anywhere else ; referring to some statistical 
papers, I notice that while for several years past the 
general rate of increase of population on the coast has 
been something like 6 per cent, per annum (not 20 
per cent., as stated by the editor of the New York 
Herald), the wages of labour have fallen in the same 
porportion, so that from year to year the variation in 
this respect is not remarkable, which to workmen pro- 
posing to emigrate is a very important consideration. 
It will be noticed that, from this schedule, farm servants 
are omitted ; the reasons for this is, that as a class they 
can scarcely be said to exist. Shepherds, ploughmen, 
gardeners, ostlers, &c, command the highest rates of 
skilled labour. The miners seldom turn their attention 
to these pursuits, for engaging in which, want of early 
training, wandering habits, and a speculative turn of 
mind unfit them. 

But perhaps the greatest want of all is felt in the 
absence of female servants. Colonists have ceased to 
endeavour to remedy the defect, by importing them, as, 
whether they possess personal attractions or not, they are 
certain to get married soon after their arrival. It is 
much to be regretted that as yet none of those princely, 
benevolent, energetic individuals, who are more fre- 
quently met with in England than anywhere else, have 
taken the matter up, or endeavoured to effect for the 
surplus female population of England, and for the distant 
colony, what was done at New South Wales by Mrs. 
Caroline Chisholm, whose courage, perseverance, and 
success in conducting a great enterprise of this kind, 
will be referred to with affection and with pride by 
future generations of the colony she so signally assisted 
to plant. 



GOLD HUNTERS. 141 

Persons who understand a trade, such as saddlers, 
shoemakers, tailors, and watchmakers, &c, with capital 
enough to start a shop, and make themselves known, 
would be certain to succeed. 

Persons desirous to try gold digging will find all the 
reliable statistical information on the subject, procurable 
in the Chapter on Minerals, and will there find that to sue-, 
ceed at it, a man must be strong, and capable of encoun- 
tering fatigue and even hardship with patient endurance. 
In fact, it is a sort of labour that our " navvies " would 
succeed in, and have succeeded in, to perfection. For 
example, " Bendigo " and his companions have, by their 
excavations near Ballarat, written their names on the 
sands and in the maps, in a very indelible way. 

I am the more particular to mention this, because I 
have met with many young men, who, not acquainted 
with the practical processes of gold mining, form ro- 
mantic ideas about what is in reality very hard work. 
To such, I should suggest, get Harpers Magazine, of 
April last * ; it contains a practical account of the 
various processes resorted to, and woodcut illustrations 
of implements used in mining ; construct a " rocker," the 
materials of which will not cost many shillings. Place 
the rocker under the pump, and fill the box that is on 
the top with gravel. Now, recollecting that a few half- 
pence worth of gold to a (milk) pan of gravel pays the 
miner 21. & day, file three-pennyworth from a half- 
sovereign into the box ; rock away with one hand and 
pump with the other, only stopping to shovel gravel 
into the box, as often as you 'empty it ; in this way you 
will be able not only to acquire a good idea of the 
amount of physical exertion required, but also to test 

* 1860. 



142 ALIENS. 

your skill in the art, before you have occasion to prac- 
tise it many thousand miles from home. By attentively 
reading the article hi question, you will also see that- 
the art of " prospecting," on which so much depends, 
can be learned quite as well at the duck-pond in the 
garden, as on the banks of the Fraser or Saskatchewan. 
And if, after counting the cost, you still determine to 
try your fortune, I should say the surface diggings of 
British Columbia, or the gold deposited from disinte- 
gration that has been going on for ages past, are as yet 
unexhausted. Be early in the field, and may success 
attend your adventure ! 

The steps that have been taken to facilitate the pur- 
chase of lands by aliens will be found in the Appendix. 



APPENDIX. 



To J. D. Pemberton, Esq. 

Port Rupert, July 9th, 1859. 
Dear Sir, 

I beg to forward a copy of my rough journal to Nootka, and with 
it a chart *, unfinished, but pretty correct, of the Koskimo Inlet, 
Portage, and coast of Vancouver Island, as far as Nimkish Eiver. 
Regarding the opposite coast (the mainland), I have little to say ; 
grizzly bears are found there as far north as Lynn's Canal (lat. 59°) ; 
but I heard of but one instance of their being found on Vancouver 
Island, namely, one shot last winter up the Nimpkish Lake. He 
had most probably found his way across from the mainland. 

Dear Sir, 

Yours truly, 

Hamilton Moffat. 

Journal of a Tour across Vancouver Island to Nootka Sound via 
Nimkish River, in the year 1852, by Hamilton Moffatt, Hudson's 
Bay Company's Service. 

Thursday, July 1st. — About 10 a.m. left the Fort for the Nimkish 
village, en route to the Nootka tribe. Having arrived at the Nim- 
kish River at 7 p.m., I procured guides and got everything in readi- 
ness for an early start in the morning. 

Friday, 2nd. — Left the village at daybreak in a canoe with six 
Indians; at 9 a.m. reached the Nimkish fishing village, on the 
borders of the T'sllelth Lake ; entered the lake about 10 a.m. The 
shores on either side at this end rise perpendicular from the water's 
edge to the height of some 1500 or 1600 feet, and from 4000 to 5000 
feet a little inland, and in many places capped with snow ; the 
width of the lake at the entrance is about half a mile, gradually 

* See Map, No. I. 



144 APPENDIX. 

widening to one and a half miles ; I endeavoured to ascertain the 
depth with a forty fathom line, but did not succeed. Our course 
through the lake was about south-east, and the length I have since 
ascertained to be fully twenty-five miles. In the evening we en- 
camped at the River Oakseey, distant about a mile from the head. 
Discovered a tree resembling the walnut, having a trunk about 
four and a half feet in circumference, and emitting a fine perfume. 

Saturday, 3rd. — After passing a most unpleasant night, on account 
of the rain which poured down in torrents the whole time and until 
10 a.m., we again embarked in our frail craft for the ascent of the 
River Oakseey ; stopped for a short time at the mouth to examine a 
large beaver's dam, the finest I have yet seen. The whole of this 
day was spent in working up the rapids, of which the river is one 
continuation ; encamped in the evening at Waakash, the half way 
house to the second lake, a distance of twelve miles. The banks of the 
river are rather low, and abounding in splendid red pine and maple 
of all sizes, but not the slightest vestige of cleared land to be seen. 
The country a short distance inland from the river is very high. 

Sunday, 4th. — Left encampment about 4 a.m. for another of the 
Nimkish fishing villages, at which we arrived at noon, where we 
landed to obtain a supply of fresh salmon, but were only able to 
procure three and a few trout, as it was rather early for the fish to 
be up the river. The river at this place branches off in two different 
directions ; the distance from Waakash to this place is about seven or 
eight miles, and the river, as yesterday, nothing but rapids. We re- 
mained only a short time here, and started for the Lake Kanus, 
distant about six miles. The Indians having told me that this part 
of the river was very shallow, and that the country through which 
we had to pass to the lake pretty open, I started on foot with a 
portion of my crew, and arrived at the lake after a very pleasant 
walk ; the country through which I passed was clear, with occa- 
sional belts of wood and brush, and abounding in partridges, of 
which I shot a good many. I also noticed a pond of cold spring 
water, of great depth, without an outlet, similar to what are at home 
called blow- wells. 

During my wall?: I was informed of a tribe of Indians living- 
inland, having no canoes or connection with the sea-coast whatever. 
I have since learned that these people sometimes descend some of 
the rivers for the purpose of trade with the Indians south of Nootka, 
and they offered to guide me to the place at any time I should wish ; 
the name of the tribe is Saa Kiialituck ; they number about fifty or 
sixty men, and were only discovered a few years back, by one of 
the Nimkish chiefs while on a trapping expedition. The following 
is the Indians' story of their discovery : — 



APPENDIX. 145 

Our party while sitting round the fire on the banks of a small 
rivulet, observed a beaver playing in the water, and having followed 
the course of the stream in hopes of falling in with a dam, came 
suddenly upon a lake, and the first thing which struck our attention 
was a small village situated at the opposite side. Upon entering the 
camp we were well received by the Indians, and opened a trade for 
skins, of which they had an abundance, and which they used for 
clothing. They informed us, that southern Indians (as we supposed 
the Sanetch) had been there on war parties, and killed a good num- 
ber of them. This tribe are known to the Nootkas, who have a 
superstitious idea that they are the spirits of their dead, on account 
of their speaking the same language. From the time the Nimkish 
say it takes to perform the journey, and from the Sanetch (or more 
probably the Comox) having knowledge of these people, I have not 
the least doubt that a road might with little difficulty be discovered 
from here to Victoria, through the very centre of the island. 

After passing through this lake, which is probably ten miles long, 
we encamped at the base of a snow-capped mountain, two very fine 
cascades falling several hundred feet from its summit ; and the streams 
which they form abound in trout of excellent quality and great size, 
numbers of which we caught. 

Monday, 6th. — Early this morning I started, accompanied by an 
Indian, for the summit of this mountain, which I named Ben Lomond, 
but did not succeed in reaching any further than the second tier of 
snow, on account of the ascent being so steep ; so having been disap- 
pointed in my walk, I returned to the camp at 9 a.m., and set out 
for the walk across the portage (which was a succession of mountain 
defiles), to the head waters of the Nootka River. This river, during 
its course of three or four miles from its source, disappears three 
different times. Stopped about noon to dine, and after half an hour's 
rest recommenced our journey, and arrived in Nootka Sound at 
7 p.m., after passing over sixteen or eighteen miles. I have not, 
however, reached my destination for the night yet, the Indians 
wishing to encamp further down the sound, on account of some 
superstitious fear of ghosts. Stopped for a short time at the fishing 
village, where I saw the wheel of a ship. The Indian houses here 
are very large, in fact more so than those of the Indians near Fort 
Rupert. 

Tuesday, 6th. — Having passed a very comfortable night under 
cover of a large quantity of salmon frames, we started early for the 
Nootka village in Friendly Cove, passing through a long inlet that 
runs about south-east, surrounded by lofty mountains covered to the 
very top with timber, but of stunted growth. We arrived at our desti- 

L 



146 APPENDIX. 

nation at 4 P. m., having occupied five days on our journey from the 
Nimkish village. 

Upon entering Friendly Cove we were received by a discharge of 
cannon from the chief's house ; until we were about to land scarcely 
an Indian was to be seen, but at a given signal the whole tribe 
darted from their houses and commenced a grand dance in honour of 
the arrival of a white man to visit them, after which a sea otter was 
presented to me by the chief, and we landed amid the welcome 
shouts of the Nootkas. In the evening a grand fancy dress ball was 
given, and a large quantity of blankets and other property distri- 
buted. 

Wednesday, 7 th. — Nothing strange or new ; time mostly spent in 
feasting and smoking in the houses of the different chiefs, all of 
whom seemed to be on the highest terms of friendship. 

Remarks. 

The timber in the interior of the island is very fine, in fact the 
banks on both sides of the Nimkish river, from the first lake almost 
to the Nootka inlet, are lined with splendid red pines, large and long 
enough for the spars of the largest men of war ; the water communi- 
cation is also a great consideration ; spars could be squared, rolled 
into the water, and floated down without difficulty to any depot, such 
as the anchorage at Illece or even Beaver Cove. Other timber is 
also abundant. 

The various kinds of rock along the bed of the river, as far as I 
could see, were granite, sandstone, conglomerate, and hard dark 
boulders. 

The various berries of the country grew in great abundance, with 
the exception of the small dark berry resembling a beaver shot ; I 
am unacquainted with the name ; it is plentiful down south and at 
Comox. Salmon of various kinds, of splendid quality, are found in 
abundance on the coast, as well as halibut and other sea fish. 

Eock oysters of large size I procured to the north of Nootka, some 
fifty miles, but saw few other shell-fish, except the large sea 
mussel and the barnacle. Crabs and sea egg were plentiful, also 
the sea cucumber, and the various species of star-fish and sea 
anemones. 

The zoology is the same as the other parts of Vancouver Island, 
except that the purple marmot is occasionally found at Koskimo, but 
not the common grey marmot. The white land otters which have at 
various times been forwarded from here, were killed near Kio- 
quettuck. 

The Indians from Nootka to Newittee number probably about 



APPENDIX. 147 

1500 men. The depth of the Nimkish Lake I have since sounded, 
and got no bottom at seventy-five fathoms, from the stern of a canoe, 
her bow being aground on shore. 



EXCURSION FROM QUALLCHUM (LAT. 49° 23'), via LAKE HORN AND 
ALBERNI CANAL, TO THE PACIFIC. 

To His Excellency the Governor. 

Victoria, Vancouver's Island, 

December loth, 1856. 
Sir, 

I had the honour, in the middle of October last, to receive your 
instructions to examine a part of the island from a point north of 
Nanaimo to an inlet of the sea reached by Mr. Home, and beg to 
submit for your information, and that of the Governor and Com- 
mittee of the Hudson's Bay Company, the result of such observations 
as I was able to make, together with a map on which they are laid 
down. 

As it was rather late in the season, I was not able to take many 
observations, and the map must be regarded as a mere reconnais- 
sance, which would, however, materially assist in any fixture survey, 
the part about Barclay Sound being the least accurate. 

The principal observations attempted being as follows ; and the 
filling in is by compass and estimation. 

A correction is made in the coast-line between Valdez Inlet and 
point Leonardo. 

The track from Quallchum to Home's Lake is principally through 
burnt woods ; soil gravelly. Home's Lake is probably 150 feet 
above the sea; the summit level between Home's Lake and head of 
Alberni Canal is 800 to 900 feet above the sea ; the track through 
forest, soil gravelly, and indifferent. A better road might be cut a 
little to the south of the lake : for a road from Nanaimo to the head 
of the canal the country is not yet examined. A ridge of mountains 
(some snow on them) occupying the middle of the island in the di- 
rection of its length, but not unbroken, is shown on the map. 

Alberni Canal. — Deep ; perfectly free from rocks, or any impedi- 
ment to navigation ; one mile wide ; hills 1500 to 1800 feet high 
on both sides, covered with pines, and springing from the water's 
edge ; small waterfalls from great heights frequent ; sandstone met 

i, 2 



148 APPENDIX. 

with at the head of the canal, and occasionally in the rivers ; pine 
tops on the hills bent from the south-west. 

Barclay Sound*, when properly examined and surveyed, will, I 
should think, be found capable of affording admirable shelter to 
vessels of any class. The coast between Barclay Sound and Point 
Bonilla is dangerous (sunken rocks and heavy seas when wind is 
westerly). 

Head of Canal to Opochesath. — Eiver broad (say eighty yards) and 
shallow. Eiver to central lake exceedingly rapid — several water- 
falls, forty or fifty yards wide — and -contains two or three times as 
much water as the Nanaimo River does at the same time of year ; 
quantities of white cedar on the banks : the scenery about Opoche- 
sath and head of the inlet is often very beautiful ; but there is no 
great extent of valuable or open land. 

Central Lake is surrounded by mountains, covered with pines. 
Ice said to be very thick on it in the winter ; length not ascertained ; 
after ten miles no bottom at 100 fathoms. Occasional soundings at 
low- water in fathoms, in the canal and lakes, are marked on the 
map. Fish (trout excepted) and game of all kinds are scarce in the 
interior in winter time. Salmon is found in great abundance in the 
canal and in the stream falling into it ; halibut also ; and elk and 
deer are plenty on the coast, even near the Indian villages. 

Timber. — In the immediate neighbourhood of Barclay Sound, the 
land is low and rocky, or swampy, and timber indifferent. Some of 
the valleys extending from the canal contain fine timber, and in the 
neighbourhood of Opochesath spars of large size. Woods oftenest 
met with are, P. Menzies, P. Inops (Hooker), P. Douglasii, hem- 
lock spruce, Weymouth pine, white cedar, and arbutus. 

The precautions you were good enough to suggest with regard to 
the Indians on the sea-board, who are numerous, were quite neces- 
sary, and by availing myself of your better judgment and greater 
experience in those matters, I had no difficulty with them. Your 
opinion that no confidence is to be placed in them is quite correct. 

I have, &c. 

J. Despard Pemberton. 



* Was subsequently visited by Captain Prevost of H.M.S.S. "Satellite," 
whose opinion of the entrance to Barclay Sound was unfavourable. When 
there, I looked for Port Effingham, so highly spoken of by Mears, and confess 
I could not find it. Mears' map of the sound bears but little resemblance to 
the original. 



Sir. 



APPENDIX. 149 

FROM COWICHAN HARBOUR TO NITINAT. 

To His Excellency the Governor. 

Victoria, Nov. 12th, 1857. 



Early in September last I was honoured by your instructions to 
examine and report upon the country between Cowichan Harbour 
and Nitinat of the Indians (not the Nitinat usually marked on maps 
of Vancouver's Island in Barclay Sound). 

The party consisting of myself, Lieutenant Gooch, of H. M, S. 
Satellite, who joined as an amateur, but was afterwards of much 
service in every emergency ; two marines, and two seamen, selected 
from the Satellite by Captain Prevost ; two men of the Surveying 
Department ; and Antoine an Iroquois hunter, — nine men in all ; 
taking with them ten or twelve days' provision, which with their 
arms and ammunition was as much as they could carry ; left Cow- 
ichan Harbour on the 4th of September, and reached the Nitinat 
camp, on the west coast, safely on the 19th of the same month. 

I might have given more time to the examination of this exceed- 
ingly interesting section of country, but from the unavoidable 
scarcity of hunters in our party, it was necessary to reach the coast 
when we did. Game, consisting of elk, black bears, deer and grouse 
are to be found on the route, as well as fish in the rivers and lakes, 
but for the reason mentioned our party killed nothing of much use 
on the way, except one deer and one bear, another badly wounded 
by Antoine having got away. 

The principal instruments and chronometer I carried myself, but 
as the country is heavily timbered, after passing Mount Prevost, and 
the fallen trees slippery to walk on, occasional falls was a thing 
unavoidable, which so damaged the instruments that I regret to say 
the observations, though taken with the utmost care, proved useless, 
and the map annexed a compass sketch. 

The valuable tract of country extending from the sea to Mount 
Prevost and the Somenos village, you have yourself examined, and 
will therefore not require a description of from me. After passing 
the Somenos Plains the Cowichan River becomes more rapid, and 
the country covered with pines of different kinds ; between the 
Somenos Plains and the large lake, several tracts of country eligible 
for settlement will be found, but they will require to be cleared. 
The situations alluded to will have all the advantages of a fertile 
soil, good water, game and fish, variety of timber, the appearance 



150 APPENDIX. 

of the surrounding country being generally pretty and cheerful, often 
grand. The same remarks will apply to the land in many places 
bordering upon the large lake. 

In the valleys, Douglas pines, twenty-three feet to twenty- eight 
feet in circumference, are not uncommon. Indians occasionally hunt 
and fish on the border of the large lake, and the stumps of huge 
cedars, cut down at its western extremity, show that they once 
manufactured their largest canoes there. We met no Indians between 
Somenos village and South River. In rounding Mount Gooch we 
passed through a forest of hemlock-spruce, larger than any I had 
seen before, often eight or nine feet in diameter. 

South River contains a large body of water, has several falls, a 
considerable quantity of flat land on its banks, particularly on the 
right bank ; pine-trees (P. Menzies) six feet to nine feet diameter, 
of corresponding height, standing at regular intervals ; the under- 
growth of raspberries, ferns, &c. being exceedingly thick. The 
banks of Nitinat Inlet are rocky on the west side, and mountainous 
on the east. Off the entrance, which in one place does not look 
more than one hundred feet wide, there appears to be a bar. I 
was not able to take soundings. 

The tide rushing out through this narrow entrance with great 
velocity, and meeting the tide coming in, makes a whirlpool, which 
has a very remarkable appearance. Perhaps at high water a vessel 
of large size could be floated in, as the water then is still. 

Gold-bearing rocks are met with in the mountains, sandstone is 
frequently found in the beds of the rivers ; the coast about Nitinat 
is formed of sandstone, and small seams of coal are occasionally 
met with in it ; in the inlet I noticed one large cliff of bluish pri- 
mitive limestone. 

Trusting that the circumstances mentioned in the earlier part of 
this report will somewhat excuse its incompleteness, 

I have, &c. 

J. Despard Pemberton. 



EXTRACT FROM JOURNAL OF CAPTAIN VANCOUVER. 

" Fetched five miles to the S. E. of the breakers, into the entrance 
of an opening that had the appearance of admitting us a considerable 
way up, though in the Spanish charts this inlet is not noticed. 
" In this neighbourhood there is a greater extent of low country 



APPENDIX. 151 

than about Nootka or Clayoquot ; it produces forest trees of many- 
sorts and of considerable size ; and, on examination, there might 
probably be found a more eligible situation for an establishment 
than at either of those places." 

This place ought, if only in compliment to the great navigator, 
to be carefully examined. 



FORT SIMPSON TO THE INTERIOR OF BRITISH COLUMBIA. 

Extract of a Letter from Mr. William Downie, giving an account of 
his Journey from Victoria to Queen Charlotte's Island, and thence 
by Fort Simpson to Fort St. James, Stuart Lake. 

Stuart's Lake, Oct. 10th, 1859. 
Sir, 

I beg to make the following report of my trip to Queen Charlotte's 
Island, and my journey- thence by Fort Simpson to the interior of 
British Columbia. 

I left Fort Simpson for the Skeena river on the 5th of August. 
From Fort Simpson to Port Essington is about forty miles. The 
salt water here appears a light blue colour, and runs inland about 
thirty miles ; the coarse grained quartz of Fort Simpson is no longer 
seen here ; granite appears. The banks of the river are low, with 
small hard wood, and cotton-trees on its margin, with some good- 
sized white oaks, the finest I have seen west of Fraser River. 

Vessels drawing more than four feet of water cannot go more 
than twenty miles up the Skeena river, and it is very unlike the 
deep inlets to the southward. At our camp here some Indians 
visited us ; they told us they were honest, but in the morning the 
absence of my coat rather negatived their statement. Next day we 
found the river shoal even for loaded canoes, as it had fallen much. 
I went up a small river at our next camp, called Scenatoys, and the 
Indians showed me seme crystallised quartz, and to my surprise a 
small piece with gold in it, being the first I have seen in this part. 
The Indian took me to a granite slide, whence he asserted the piece 
of quartz in question had come from ; I found some thin crusts of 
fine quartz, but nothing like a rich vein. Ten miles further I 
found more fine grained quartz, but no gold. I am of opinion, how- 
ever, that good paying quartz will be found here. 

From the small river just mentioned at the mouth of the Skeena 
or Port Essington, it is seventy -five miles ; a little below it, an Indian 
trail leads to Fort Simpson ; it is through a low pass, and fefre distance 
is not great. 

l 4 



152 APPENDIX. 

From this, ten miles further up, is a small river called the Foes, 
on the south side ; hence is an Indian trail to Kitloops, on the 
Salmon River. The south branch of Salmon River is called Kit- 
tama. 

By this time we were fairly over the coast range of mountains, and 
those ahead of us did not look very high. The current here was 
strong, and much labour required to get the canoe along, and we 
had to pull her up by a rope from the shore. 

Gold is found here, a few specks to the pan, and the whole 
country looks like a gold country with fine bars and flats, and clay 
on the bars. The mountains look red, and slate and quartz can be 
seen. 

Our next camp was at the village of Kitthalaska ; and I started 
in a light canoe ahead of my party, as our Ganoe, by all accounts, 
could not get much further ; I then determined to penetrate to Fort 
Fraser (supposed to mean establishment of H. B. Company). 

The Indian who was with me informed me that a large stream 
called the Kitchumsala comes in from the north, the land on it is 
good, and well adapted for farming; the Indians grow plenty of 
potatoes here. To the south a small stream, called the Chimkootsh, 
enters, on the south-west of which is the Plumbago Mountain ; I 
had some of it in my hand ; it is as clear as polished silver, and runs 
in veins of quartz. Near this are the words " Pioneer H. B. C." on 
a tree nearly overgrown with the bark. The Indian told me this 
was cut by Mr. John Work, a long time ago. From here to the 
village of Kitcoonsa the land improves, the mountains recede from 
the river, and fine flats run away four or five miles back to the 
mountain sides, where the smoke is seen rising from the Indian huts; 
they are occupied in picking and drying berries for the winter. 
The Indians here were very kind to me, and wished me to build a 
house and live with them. 

Above the village of Kitcoonsa the prospect of gold is less ; below 
it, a man could make a dollar a day. As the season was so ad- 
vanced I was not able to prospect the hills which look so well about 
here, and unless the Government take it in hand it will be a long 
time before the mineral resources of this part of British Columbia 
are known. I think this is the best looking mineral country I have 
seen in British Columbia. 

From here to the village of Kitsogatala the river is rocky and 
dangerous, and our canoe was split from stem to stern. 

Here we enter an extensive coal country, the seams being cut 
through by the river, and running up the banks on both sides, vary- 
ing in thickness from three to thirty-five feet. 



APPENDIX. 153 

The veins are largest on the north-east side, and sandstone 
appears ; it is soft, and gives easily to the pick. 

The veins dip into the bank for a mile in length, and could be 
easily worked on the face by tunnels, and also by sinking shafts at 
the rear on the flats, as they run into banks of soft earth. I have 
seen no coal like this in all my travels in British Columbia or Van- 
couver Island. Here we had some danger from Indians, but a small 
present of tobacco, and putting aside all fear, or even appearance of 
it, succeeded in quieting them. I find it best to be cool and deter- 
mined in the prospect of a fight. 

The land around Naas Glee is first rate, and wild hay and long 
grass abounds. Potatoes are not grown here. There is no heavy 
pine timber in the neighbourhood, and the canoes are made of 
cotton wood. 

Our course from Naas Glee to Fort Killamaurs, was N. E, and the 
distance about fifty miles. The land is good the whole way, with 
long grass on the benches near Fort killamaurs. This is a very 
lovely place, and no sound to be heard save one, — our voice. It 
seems a great pity to see this beautiful land, so well adapted for the 
wants of man, laying waste, when so many Englishmen and Scotch- 
men would be glad to come here and till the soil. ' Babine Lake is 
deep, and in some places five or six miles wide ; there are islands 
and points of land to afford shelter from the storm, wherever the 
wind blows from. 

At the head of Babine Lake there is a fine site for a town, and 
a good harbour could be made. A stream runs down here which 
would supply water for the town. This is what I call the head 
waters of Skeena Eiver. There is plenty of water in the lake for 
steamers, and it is a hundred miles in length. From here to Stuart's 
Lake there is a portage over a good trail, and through the finest 
grove of cotton wood I have ever seen, to Stuart's Lake ; the ground 
was thickly strewed with golden leaves, giving the scene an autumnal 
appearance, altogether different to what we expected to find in 
British Columbia.* 

William Downie. . } 

To His Excellency, Governor Douglas, C. B., &c. &c. 



* The harbour of Fort Simpson is a very safe, though not a perfect, harbour ; 
the anchorage is good. It is apparently exposed to the west and south-west, 
but it is protected from the swell by a reef, covered at high water and exposed 
at half tide. This harbour may be by and by of importance, especially if it 
shall be found necessary to open a road into the northern part of British Co- 
lumbia, direct from the coast. — J. D. P. 



154 APPENDIX. 



DOUBLING CAPE HORN. 



For the information of persons intending to emigrate by long sea, 
who will naturally wish to know at what times and under what cir- 
cumstances the voyage round the Horn is most favourably made, the 
following remarks, extracted from " Navigation of the Pacific," by 
Captain A. B. Becher, R.N. F.R.A.S. &c. 1860, are here inserted : — 

Doubling Cape Horn from the Atlantic. — Seamen who have 
doubled Cape Horn have given different directions on some points 
of the subject, but those will be adopted here which appear to be 
the most trustworthy. But before pointing out the proper routes it 
may be right to say a word or two on the most favourable season for 
entering the Pacific from the eastward. 

Captain J. Weddel grounds his opinion on the experience of five 
years in navigating these parts, and considers the months of March 
and April as the worst for doubling Cape Horn. He says the diffi- 
culties of doubling this cape may be greatly diminished by choosing 
the proper season for it, and loss of time may be avoided as well as 
injury to the ship. 

In the beginning of November northerly winds set in and continue 
till the middle of February, when they are succeeded by those from 
S. W. During these months the westerly wind is not of long dura- 
tion, and then the passage is easily made. From the 20th of Febru- 
ary, or thereabouts, to the middle of May the winds generally vary 
between S.W. and N.W., and are very strong. During this time, 
therefore, a badly-found ship and one that is not tight should not 
attempt the passage. But from the middle of May to the end of 
June the prevailing winds are easterly, with fine weather ; and these 
six weeks offer a good opportunity for doubling the ^cape, even in 
sight of the island of Diego Ramirez. Then in July, August, Sep- 
tember, and October the prevailing winds vary from S.W. to N.W., 
and August and September are especially stormy months. 

These remarks appear conclusive as to the best time for doubling 
Cape Horn. 

As to the route to be adopted when from the eastward, continues 
Capt. Weddle, this greatly depends on the time of being off the cape, 
and on the strength of the westerly winds which prevail in these 
latitudes. I prefer, under all circumstances, to pass west of the 
Falkland Islands. In the summer the Strait of Lemaire may be 
taken, as it shortens the passage by fifty or sixty miles ; and this may 
be done without danger, provided we have daylight for clearing it, 
admitting that at the southern end we meet with southerly winds. 

Cape Horn is about thirty -one leagues from Cape Good Success, 



APPENDIX. 155 

with Barnevelt Island between them. If desirous of anchoring near 
Cape Horn the route S.b.W.^W. (compass) during the night will take 
a ship clear of the N.W. current, which sometimes sets among the 
islands at the entrance of Nassau Strait. If not intending to anchor, 
the most advantageous route after leaving the Strait of Lemaire 
would be to make to the southward, passing south of the cape and 
Diego Eamirez at a distance of several miles. 

In the summer, when working westward in the vicinity of the cape, 
towards evening take care to be near the coast of Terra del Fuego, 
because during the night northerly winds often come off the land and 
veer west in the morning. This, however, depends in a great 
measure on the seasons mentioned for passing Cape Horn. In fact, 
during those months when the wind is most violent, as in March, 
August, and September, the seaman should follow the directions 
given by Anson and King, who recommend standing to the south as 
far as 60°, where a smoother sea and more moderate and steadier 
winds will be found. Nevertheless, when a ship is obliged to make 
her passage along the coast, the places where she may anchor with 
safety are Wigwam Bay, Port Maxwell, Indian Cove, New Year 
Sound, and Clear Bottom Bay. 

Such are generally the remarks of Captain Weddel. We will now 
see what others say on doubling the cape. 

As we have already observed, Captain King recommends a ship 
from the Atlantic intending to double Cape Horn to run down the 
coast of Patagonia at a hundred miles distance. Captain Fitz-Roy 
does not agree in this opinion. I do not think, he says, that it would 
be important for a large well-built vessel to keep near the east coast 
of Patagonia. The sea, it is true, is smoother there, but the current 
near the coast sets northward, with more strength than out at sea. 
But, when in sight of the coast no ice is met, while further east it is 
found even north of the parallel of 40° S. Instead of going to the 
south as far as the parallel of 60° S., as Captain King says, I prefer 
to work to the westward near Terra del Fuego, towards Nassau Bay. 
In Orange Bay a ship may await a favourable moment to mak£ a long 
board to the west. If disappointed of this, she may return to her 
anchorage under Black Island in Euston Bay, or elsewhere, and 
await a more favourable time. To make westing is the principal 
object to be kept in view till we reach the meridian of 82° west. 
We do not find ice near Terra del Fuego, but frequently meet with 
it seaward from this island. In the route here pointed out near 
Cape Horn and the land many dangers and injuries to the vessel will 
be avoided by remaining quietly at anchor during the bad weather, 
and profiting by any change of weather or wind to make westing. It 
appears from this that Fitz-Roy prefers in all cases the route nearest 



156 APPENDIX. 

the land. Weddel's opinion differs from his, for he advises this route 
during summer, and the sea route down to the parallel of 60° or 
thereabouts during winter. 

Fitz-Roy's opinion is here supported by that of Cook, La Perouse, 
and Krusenstern, as well as Capt. Beechey. I do not see, says this 
officer, the necessity for going far south to double Cape Horn. One 
thing I only recommend, namely, to adopt that tack on which most 
westing is made without thinking of latitude further than to pass 
twenty leagues south of this cape. With north-west winds I should 
run south-west, and with south-west winds north-west, and in case 
neither board is favourable, I would stand to the southward, unless 
I was in too high a latitude. The strongest winds are not found 
near the coast, as is supposed; quite the contrary: and at thirty 
miles from it, the sea breaks from the inequality of the bottom. 
There is, however, one serious objection to approaching the coast 
east of Cape Horn, and that is, the rapidity with which the current 
sets across Lemaire Strait, particularly with southerly winds. This 
is not the case west of Diego Ramirez, and I do not see any objection 
in this part to approach the coast to about forty or sixty miles. Near 
Diego Ramirez I found little or no current. 

When doubling Cape Horn from the eastward, we should pass 
inside or west of the Falkland Islands, and pass east of Staten Island, 
but as near as possible to it, because south-west winds are often met 
with as soon as the Pacific Ocean is open. North-west winds off 
the Falklands generally become west or south-west as Staten Island 
is approached, and with the wind from west off this island we have 
only to run south. However, this course need not be taken unless 
we can make westing. Even if we gain little or nothing on the other 
tack, we should keep near the shore, for there is no advantage in 
making southing if it is not to avoid losing in the westing. We 
should not, however, take much liberty with the coast while east 
of Cape Horn. Such are the most general rules for doubling this 
cape. 

As to passing through Lemaire Strait, or outside Staten Island, 
opinions differ. The prudent course is to adopt the latter, although 
the passage through the straits gains to windward and shortens the 
route. But with a southerly wind it should never be taken, for with 
the tide running against the wind, the sea in the strait becomes boist- 
erous. With a calm it would still be wrong to adopt it, unless the 
west coast of the strait (for anchorage) cannot be reached, on account 
of the tide setting toward Staten Island. Everywhere else the an- 
chorage is in deep water and close to the shore. However, with 
northerly winds, this route appears to be very advantageous. Such 
is King's opinion, and Captain Fitz-Roy's also, whose opinion is un- 



APPENDIX. 157 

questioned, and who considers that there is no difficulty in taking 
Lemaire Strait. The only danger to be apprehended is calm. Vessels 
from the southward are not very liable to this danger, in south-west 
winds at least ; and in this case they would probably find north-west 
winds in the northern part of the strait. The Bay of Good Success 
is, however, admirably situated for affording shelter should wind or 
tide fail. 

In passing Staten Island from the southward, the tide rips, extend- 
ing some distance off the north-east part of the island, should be 
avoided ; but there are no dangers near the island. The foregoing 
is sufficient to convey an idea as to how to double Cape Horn from 
the eastward. 

Most seamen who have frequented these latitudes (as King, Basil 
Hall, Beechey, La Perouse, &c.) agree that the barometer does not 
give any certain indications near Cape Horn, and that it can only be 
depended on in middle latitudes. That although the mercury often 
rises or falls before a change in the weather, the rising or falling 
more often follows the change. The mean height of the barometer 
is 2 9" 5 inches. With north-west winds the mercury is low; if it 
falls to 29'0 or 28*8 inches, expect south-west winds, which only 
commence when the mercury ceases to fall. But again, a fall in the 
mercury often occurs without being followed by any change in the 
weather. 

Magellan Strait. — In reference to the Straits of Magellan, King's 
directions for the Patagonian coast must be followed by vessels from 
the Atlantic to the Pacific. For steamers, especially if small, this 
passage will be advantageous; but with a sailing vessel it is both 
tedious and dangerous. 

For a small vessel coming from the Pacific to the Atlantic, the 
passage of Magellan Strait is very advantageous. It is always safe, 
very nearly as quick, and not so dangerous as the route by Cape Horn. 
Thus : entering by the Gulf of Trindad, she would take Conception 
Strait, Sacramento or St. Esteban, then Smyth Channel, and the 
strait at Cape Tamar. In these channels northerly winds prevail, 
and anchorages are at hand to pass the night in. 

The winter months are undoubtedly the best for the Straits of 
Magellan when going west. When coming from west the summer 
months are preferable ; the nights being short and westerly winds 
prevailing. 

Doubling Cape Horn from West. — Passing from the Pacific into the 
Atlantic Ocean by Cape Horn, the principal objections are : dark 
cloudy weather, a heavy sea, and floating ice. For a large ship the 
passage is easy enough, and the summer months (January and Feb- 
ruary) are considered as the most favourable for it. A small vessel 



158 APPENDIX. 

having doubled the cape, would do better, and find a smoother sea, 
by passing inside the Falkland Islands from Lemaire Strait. For a 
large vessel, Beechey considers it preferable to pass east of the Falk- 
land Islands, especially in the winter, because the wind has then a 
hankering for the eastward, and thus, when past the islands, she would 
be in a good possition for reaching the River Plata. 

One of the most formidable dangers of doubling Cape Horn is 
that of smashing a low iceberg at night, when it is blowing fresh and 
a heavy sea running. According to all seamen it appears that in the 
winter and spring months (July, August, and September) they are 
most commonly met with. Sometimes these floating masses are only 
a few yards above the water, and therefore very difficult to discover 
in the night. In the dark nights of whiter these dangers therefore 
are to be provided against by the best look-out that can be kept : for 
they are mostly met in fresh winds and a heavy sea. And as Captain 
Basil Hall advises, it will be best at night under such circumstances 
to lie off the cape. With fine weather and a quiet night small sail 
may be carried, but the look-out should be doubled, the greatest pos- 
sible precautions adopted, the sails being set so as not to prevent 
the watch from seeing all round. The following precaution is re- 
commended by him. Having reefed the topsails and courses, the 
yards should be braced nearly sharp up, bowlines hauled, and every 
thing ready for going about in the night, however the wind might 
come. Then when an iceberg is seen near ahead it may be avoided 
by putting the helm up or down. In all cases the yards braced in 
renders either plan easy of execution. 

The foregoing are the best instructions seamen can have for doubling 
Cape Horn under all circumstances ; and we will now consider the 
navigation of the western coast of America. 

Navigation of the West Coast of America. — The navigation of the 
western coast of America presents no difficulties, care being taken, if 
going north, to keep in Humboldt's Current; and in running along the 
north coast during summer advantage should be taken of the Mexican 
Current. Thus the passage may be easily made from the Straits of 
Magellan to Acapulco, by taking care to profit by the monsoons of 
the Chili coast ; and the passage will be snorter or longer according 
as the monsoon is favourable or not. 



APPENDIX. 159 



REPORT OF ANALYSIS OP TWO SAMPLES OF WATER FROM VANCOUVER 

ISLAND. 

Sample A, marked March 17, 1854, taken from Salt Spring Island, 
(Admiral Island.) 

Sample B, marked March 30, 1854, taken from a Salt Spring at 
Nanaino. 

Summary. 

The results of the analysis show the following to be the constitu- 
tion of the two waters : — 



In the Imperial Gallon. 



Soluble. 


A. 


B. 


Chloride of sodium, and traces of other salts . 


Grains. 
4994 


Grains. 
3446 


Insoluble. 
Impurity ..... 


160 


nil 


Total contents in Imperial gallons 


5154 


3446 



Proportion of saline matter (chiefly salt) by weight per cent : — 

A. B. 

Saline matter (chiefly salt) . . . 6-5 4-9 

Water . . . . 93-5 95-1 



100-0 100-0 



The quantity of common salt in the imperial gallon of B. is about 
twice as great as in Atlantic sea-water, and it could much more 
easily be obtained pure, as it is not contaminated with the salts of 
magnesia. 

The water B., although less rich in salt than A., is preferable to the 
latter for the extraction of salt. The product from B. is purer. The 
springs are far from being saturated brine. Water will dissolve 
four times as much salt as is eontained in B. I have found the 
water of the Dead Sea in Palestine to contain as much as twenty-four 
per cent., three-fourths of this being common salt. 

Alfred Swaine Taylor, M.D. F.R.S. 

Lecturer on Chemistry, &c, in Guy's Hospital. 

Chemical Laboratory, Guy's Hospital, 
October 21st, 1854. 

Samples of the salt extracted from A and B are at the laboratory, 
under the care of the assistant, Mr. Andrews. 1 

1 Those interested in the manufacture of salt from brine springs I would 



160 APPENDIX. 



PROFESSOR JAMES TENNANT ON THE ROCKS OF VANCOUVER 

ISLAND. 

149 Strand, November 29th, 1852. 
Sir, 

I send the names of the specimens ; those marked with a * are 
on the first page. Several of these, viz. 5*, 8*, 9*, and 13* contain 
gold, although I do not find gold in Nos. 6*, 10*, and 14*. I be- 
lieve the vein from which the specimens were taken does contain it. 
I have not found gold in any of the specimens from No. 1 to 43 
without a * on page No. 2. 

I have, &c. 



James Tennant. 



To the Secretary, 
Hudson's Bay House. 



Page 1. 



No. 1*. Dark coloured compact limestone, with veins of calcareous 

spar. 
2*. Veins of quartz partly crystallised, in which no gold is to 

be seen. 
3*. Serpentine. 
• 4*A. Quartz crystallized. 
4*b, Clay slate, or killas. 
4*c. Clay slate, with minute crystals of iron pyrites, and veins 

of quartz.. 
5*. Part of quartz vein, with particles of gold disseminated. 
6*d. Clay slate, containing crystals of iron pyrites, and veins of 

quartz. 
6*e. Clay slate. 
7*. Dark coloured limestone rock, with calcareous spar, 

similar to No. 1. 



refer to the Prize Essay on the Manufacture of Salt, by Mr. H. Owen Hus- 
kisson, which obtained the Society's medal ; Parliamentary Report on the 
subject in 1836 ; Fownes's Chemistry ; and Ure's Dictionary of Arts and Manu- 
factures ; also, Utah and the Mormons, by Ferris. The American Patent 
Office Reports of 1857 (vol. Agricultural) contain an interesting article on the 
manufacture of salt from brine springs, as practised in America, copied from 
the Illinois Journals. — J. D. P. 



APPENDIX. 161 

8*. Part of a vein of quartz imperfectly crystallised, containing 

gold. 
9*. Clay slate, with, small crystals of iron pyrites and veins of 

quartz partly crystallised, the latter containing a small 

quantity of gold. 
10*. Clay slate, with numerous small crystals of iron pyrites, 

and veins of quartz crystallised. 
11*. Clay slate; this with Nos. 4, 6, 9, 10, 13, and 14 contains 

much silica. 
12*. Serpentine. 
13*. Clay slate, containing numerous small crystals of iron 

pyrites and veins of quartz ; in the latter particles of 

gold are distributed. 
14*. Quartz, partly crystallised, containing a small quantity of 

auriferous iron pyrites. 

(Signed) James Tennant. 



THE PACIFIC SQUADRON. NAVAL STATION. 

(From The Times Correspondent, June 26, 1860.) 

It is true, that if all that is required for a naval station be so 
much water for so many ships to float and to anchor in, and so 
many acres of ground for docks in a wilderness, these essentials are 
obtainable in Burrard's Inlet, which is about five miles across 
country from New Westminster. But, as- the naval station placed 
in that locality involves the navigation of a portion of the Straits of 
Fuca, of the whole of the Canal de Haro (under the guns of the 
American batteries if San Juan be given up), together with the 
crossing of the Gulf of Georgia, often a tempestuous sea, as well as 
the other inland waters which intervene between Burrard's Inlet 
and Esquimalt and the ocean, all of which navigation would be an 
addition to a voyage long enough already, and Avhich would be 
avoided by leaving the squadron to rendezvous at Esquimalt, where 
the ships now lie, most competent judges prefer Esquimalt for the 
head-quarters of the squadron. Esquimalt is near the ocean, easily 
accessible by day and night now that a lighthouse is placed at its 
entrance. It has good anchorage in Royal Bay, just outside, where 
a fleet could ride. Besides these conveniences, it possesses great 
facilities for fortifications over every other harbour in the Pacific 



162 APPENDIX. 

Ocean. It could be made impregnable at less cost than any other 
harbour in these seas could be rendered partially secure ; and it is 
well situated for supplying ships to defend the entrance into the 
Straits of Fuca — a measure to the accomplishment of which " Port 
San Juan," situated on Vancouver's Island, near the entrance, pos- 
sesses important facilities in having a good harbour three miles long, 
and capable of anchoring a fleet in safety. From this port one or 
two ships could blockade the entrance, and make Fuca's Straits a 
British lake, while Esquimalt is close at hand to afford supplies and 
all necessary assistance. 

While these are some of the advantages of Esquimalt, let us 
glance at the disadvantages and inconveniencies of making Burrard's 
Inlet the head-quarters. 

The tedious navigation to and fro between Esquimalt and the 
inlet I have already mentioned. There is also the additional ex- 
pense of provisioning the squadron. At Victoria the men-of-war 
get all they want, and at Esquimalt itself there is a bakery which 
supplies them with biscuit. The Admiral's communications with 
England would be delayed considerably if he were on the coast of 
British Columbia. Shut up in the inlet the squadron would be out 
of the way, and distant from the points in the Straits of Fuca where 
its services must always be most needed. Vancouver's Island will 
be the point of attack, if an attack is made on one of these colonies 
by any hostile power, as it must be secured to make the continent 
tenable if taken, so that if Burrard's Inlet were made the naval 
station it would involve this anomaly, — that while the head- 
quarters were over there, the ships would always be stationed here. 
The naval station must be at Esquimalt. 



HORSE-RACING IN CALIFORNIA. 

From Bell's Life, July 1st., 1860. 

Sacramento Races {Contreville Course). 

First day, Tuesday, April 24. — A purse of 800 dollars, for all ages ; 
Metairie Club weights ; heats, one mile. 

H. Peyton's gr. f. Susy Hawkins, by Jack Hawkins out of Lola 

Montez, by Gray Eagle, 2 yrs. . . . .11 

M. Morison's ro. f. Kate Mitchell, by Ned Murray, dam , 

2 yrs. . . . . . . . . 2 dis 

J. Merritt's (A. F. Grigsby's) b. c. Billy Hood, by Imp. Lawyer, 

dam , 2 yrs. . . . . . .3 dis 

Time, 1 : 52— 1 : 53§. 



APPENDIX. 163 

Second day, April 25. — A purse of 600 dollars, free for all ages; 
Metairie Club weights ; heats, two miles. 

N. Coomb's ch. h. Billy Cheatham, by Cracker out of Lucy, by 

Mingo, 6 yrs. . . . . . , .11 

E. S. Lathrop's (W. M. Williamson's) b. m. Bonny Belle, by Bel- 
mont out of Liz Givens, by Imp. Langford, 6 yrs. . .22 
First heat . . . 1 : 51§—1 : 56 —3 : 47§ 
Second heat . . .1:55 — 1 : 52| — 3 : 471 

Third day, April 26.— Great Match for 10,000 dollars (four mile 
heats), between the Californian-bred colt Langford and the Ken- 
tucky-bred colt Ashland. 

E. S. Lathrop's ch. c. Langford, by Belmont out of 

Liz Givens, by Imp. Langford, 4 yrs, 100 lb. up . W. Pierce 1 1 
Hon. N. Coomb's b. h. Ashland, by Imp. G-lencoe 

out of Mary Bell, by Sea Gull, 5 yrs., 1101b. up . J. Williams 2 dr 
First heat . . . 1 : 52 

Second heat . . . 1 :- 54 — 3 : 46 

Third heat . . . 1 : 57|— 5 : 43| 

Fourth heat . . . 2 : 00| — 7 : 43f 

Match for 100 dollars; heats, one mile, to rule. 

J. Merritt's b. c. Billy Hood, 2 yrs. . . . .11 

J. B. James's gr. g. Jim Thurnan, 3 yrs. . , . . 2 dis * 

Time, 1 : 56—2 : 08|. 

Fourth day, April 27. — The Proprietors' purse of 300 dollars ; free 
for all ages ; heats, one mile ; best three in five. 

Capt. H. Peyton's gr. f. Susy Hawkins, 2 yrs. (pedigree, &c. 

as above) . . . . . ...Ill 

E. S. Lathrop's (W. M. Williamson's) b. m. Bonnie Belle, 6 

yrs. (pedigree as above) . . . . .222 

Time, 1 : 51| — 1 : 52—1 : 50. 



LAW OF LAND SALES IN THE COLONIES. 

As the law itself is short, and to intending settlers particularly 
interesting, it is inserted here, omitting the preamble : — 

1. That from and after the date hereof, (January 4th, I860,) 
British subjects and aliens who shall take the oath of allegiance to 
Her Majesty and her successors, may acquire unoccupied and unre- 
served, and unsurveyed Crown land in British Columbia (not being 
the site of an existent or proposed town, or auriferous land available 

m 2 



164' APPENDIX. 

for mining, purposes, or an Indian Reserve or Settlement,) in fee 
simple, under the following conditions. 

2. The person desiring to acquire any particular plot of land of 
the character aforesaid, shall enter into possession thereof and record 
his claim to any quantity not exceeding 160 acres thereof, with the 
magistrate residing nearest thereto, paying to the said magistrate the 
sum of eight shillings for recording such claim. Such piece of land 
shall be of a rectangular form, and the shortest side of the rectangle 
shall be at least two-thirds of the longest side. The claimant shall 
give the best possible description thereof to the magistrate with 
whom his claim is recorded, together with a rough plan thereof, and 
identify the plot in question by placing at the corners of the land 
four posts, and by stating in his description any other land marks on 
the said 160 acres, which he may consider of a noticeable character. 

3. Whenever the Government survey shall extend to the land 
claimed, the claimant who has recorded his claim as aforesaid, or his 
heirs, or in case of the grant of certificate of improvement hereinafter 
mentioned, the assigns of such claimant shall, if he or they shall have 
been in continuous occupation of the same land from the date of the 
record aforesaid, be entitled to purchase the land so pre-empted at 
such rate as may, for the time being, be fixed by the Government 
of British Columbia, not exceeding the sum of ten shillings per acre. 

4. No interest in any plot of land acquired as aforesaid, shall 
before payment of the purchase money, be capable of passing to a 
purchaser unless the vendor shall have obtained a certificate from 
the nearest magistrate that he has made permanent improvements on 
the said plot to the value of ten shillings per acre. 

5. Upon payment of the purchase money, a conveyance of the 
land purchased shall be executed in favour of the purchaser, reserv- 
ing the precious minerals, with a right to enter and work the same 
in favour of the Crown, its assigns and licencees. 

6. Priority of title shall be obtained by the person first in occupa- 
tion, who shall first record his claim in manner aforesaid. 

7. Any person authorised to acquire land under the provisions of 
this Proclamation, may purchase in addition to the land pre-empted, 
in manner aforesaid, any number of acres not otherwise appropriated, 
at such rate as may be fixed by the Government, at the time when 
such land shall come to be surveyed, not to exceed ten shillings per 
acre ; five shillings to be paid down, and the residue at the time of 
survey. 

8. In the event of the Crown, its assigns or licencees, availing 
itself, or themselves, of the reservation mentioned in clause 5, a 
reasonable compensation for the waste and damage done, shall be 
paid by the person entering and working, to the person whose land 



APPENDIX. 165 

shall be wasted or damaged as aforesaid, and in case of dispute, the 
same shall be settled by a jury of six men to be summoned by the 
nearest Magistrate. 

9. Whenever any person shall permanently cease to occupy land 
pre-empted as aforesaid, the Magistrate resident nearest to the land 
in question may in a summary way, on being satisfied of such per- 
manent cessation, cancel the claim of the person so permanently 
ceasing to occupy the same, and record the claim thereto of any 
other person satisfying the requisitions aforesaid. 

10. The decision of the Magistrate may be appealed by either 
party to the decision of the Judge of the Supreme Court of Civil 
Justice of British Columbia. 

11. Any person desirous of appealing in manner aforesaid, may 
be required, before such appeal be heard, to find such security as 
may be hereafter pointed out by the rules or orders hereinafter 
directed to be published. 

12. The procedure before the Magistrate and Judge respectively, 
shall be according to such rules and orders as shall be published by 
such Judge with the approbation of the Governor for the time of 
British Columbia. 

13. Whenever a person in occupation at the time of record afore- 
said, and he, his heirs, or assigns, shall have continued in permanent 
occupation of land pre-empted, or of land purchased as aforesaid, he 
or they may, save as hereinafter mentioned, bring ejectment or tres- 
pass against any intruder upon the land so pre-empted or purchased, 
to the same extent as if he or they were seized of the legal estate in 
possession in the land so pre-empted or purchased. 

14. Nothing herein contained shall be construed as giving a right 
to any claimant to exclude free miners from searching for any of the 
precious minerals, or working the same upon the conditions aforesaid. 

15. The Government shall, notwithstanding any claim, record, or 
conveyance aforesaid, be entitled to enter and take such portion of 
the land pre-empted or purchased as may be required for roads or 
other public purposes. 

16. Water privileges and the right of carrying water for mining 
purposes, may, notwithstanding any claim recorded, purchase or 
conveyance aforesaid, be claimed and taken upon, under or over the 
said land so pre-empted or purchased as aforesaid by free miners 
requiring the same, and obtaining a grant or licence from the Gold 
Commissioner, and paying a compensation for waste or damage to 
the person whose land may be wasted or damaged by such water 
privilege or carriage of water, to be ascertained in case of dispute in 
manner aforesaid. 

17. In case any dispute shall arise between persons with regard 



166 



APPENDIX. 



to any land so acquired as aforesaid, any one of the parties in differ- 
ence may, (before ejectment or action of trespass brought,) refer the 
question in difference to the nearest Magistrate, who is hereby 
authorised to proceed in a summary way to restore the possession of 
any land in dispute to the person whom he may deem entitled to 
the same, and to abate all intrusions, and award and levy such costs 
and damages as he may think fit. 

That the measure before detailed will require some modification 
and amendment appears probable. 

For instance, if Clauses 1 and 2 were carried out in their integrity, 
the future survey of the country would prevent the confusion of 
posts and land landmarks, and the kaleidoscopic appearance exhibited 
in figure No. 1. 

Fig.V 




And in point of economy, a decided mistake would be made, 
viz. that the marking of allotments and survey of the country would 
fail to be executed in a single operation. 

I should recommend instead the decimal system of allotment, 
adopted with perfect success in Vancouver Island. Main lines are 
run, 1^ mile apart, forming squares of 1000 acres each, within which 
allotments of any size required can be arranged ad libitum to suit any 
frontage. Where the land is valueless, the detailed surveys within 
the great squares are omitted ; and in this way, with the greatest 
facility, any part of the country is surveyed roughly or minutely, 
according to its value, and connected with the rest, which will be 
at once understood by a glance at fig. 2. 



APPENDIX. 



1G7 





100 CHS. 


100 CHS. 


Fig 

100 CHS. 


2. 

IOO CMS. 


I 






IOOAC. j IOOAC. 
IOOAC. j IOOAC 
IOOAC. ! 


■ — j- — 


44- 


120 AC. | ! 
I20AC. j 
I20AC 1-.— j---- 
I20AC. j 
I20AC. ! ! 


Co ; co " 00 c co 1 co 
O | O O ! O 

P ! P j 9 J p J 

1 < ! 

'"- J — } 

1 






3 

6> 












X 

h 

Ol 
O 

z 





O 

3! 












TRUE 






O 

X 
01 




















I 














i 







Adopting this view, the claimant would of course have to be 
content to accept the lines of the allotment which might include his 
improvements. 

In Clause No. 3. I should think it will be ultimately found neces- 
sary to name an exact time when the survey may be expected to 
take place, and the claimant be required to pay for the land. 

And in Clause 17. If the dispute should be one of boundaries, 
one would suppose that the difficulty ought to be referred to the 
Surveyor-general; that a magistrate, unless he brushed up his 
mathematics to some purpose, might have considerable difficulty in 
settling it. 



AS TO THE PUKCHASE OF LANDS BY ALIENS. 



Victoria, Vancouver's Island, November 25, 1858. 

1. According to the law of England, which is also the law of 
British Columbia, an alien may hold lands, but is liable to have 
them declared forfeited to the crown at any time. 

2. No alien can be disturbed in the possession of lands by any 
other person than the Crown authorities by reason only of his being 
an alien. 



168 APPENDIX. 

3. The Colonial Government proposes to secure to aliens the full 
rights of possession and enjoyment of any lands which they may 
purchase at this sale for the space of three years. At the end of 
that time they must, if they wish to continue to hold the lands, 
either become themselves naturalised British subjects, or else convey 
their rights to British subjects. Such conveyances it is the intention 
of the Colonial Government not to disturb on the ground of any 
vendor being an alien. 

4. It is the intention of the Colonial Government to endeavour to 
obtain from the Home Government their sanction to measures for 
carrying into effect the above views, which measures are now in 
preparation; but they must depend, for their full effect, on the 
ratification by the Home Governmeut. 

The above was issued by the Chief Justice. 



Extract from Despatch from Sir E. B. Lytton to Governor Douglas, 
August 14, 1858. 

4. Foreigners, as such, are not entitled to grants of waste land of 
the Crown in British colonies. But it is the strong desire of Her 
Majesty's Government to attract to this territory all peaceful settlers, 
without regard to nation. Naturalisation should, therefore, be 
granted to all who desire it, and are not disqualified by special 
causes, and with naturalisation the right of acquiring Crown land 
should follow. 



RULES AND REGULATIONS FOR THE WORKING OP GOLD MINES, 
ISSUED IN CONFORMITY WITH THE GOLD FIELDS ACT, 1859. 

Whereas it is provided by the Gold Fields Act 1859, that the 
Governor, for the time being, of British Columbia, may, by writing 
under his hand and the public seal of the colony, make rules and 
regulations in the nature of by-laws, for all matters relating to 
mining. 

And whereas, in conformity with the said Act, certain rules and 
regulations have already been issued bearing date the 7th of Sep 
tember, 1859. 

1. The mines in the said level benches shall be known as "bench 
diggings," and shall for the purpose of ascertaining the size of claims 



APPENDIX. 169 

therein be excepted out of the class of" dry diggings," as defined in 
the rules and regulations of the 7th of September last. 

2. The ordinary claims on any bench diggings shall be registered 
by the gold commissioner according to such one of the two following 
methods of measurement as he shall deem most advantageous on each 
mine, viz. : One hundred feet square, or else a strip of land twenty- 
five feet deep at the edge of the cliff next the river, and bounded by 
two straight lines carried as nearly as possible in each case perpen- 
dicular to the general direction of such cliff across the level bench up 
to, and not beyond the foot of the descent in the rear; and in such 
last mentioned case, the space included between such two boundary 
lines when produced over the face of the cliff in front as far as the 
foot of such cliff and no farther, and all mines in the space so 
included shall also form a part of such claim. 

3. The gold commissioner shall have authority in cases where the 
benches are narrow to mark the claims in such manner as he shall 
think fit, so as to include an adequate claim. And shall also have 
power to decide on the cliffs which, in his opinion, form the natural 
boundaries of benches. 

4. The gold commissioner may in any mine of any denomination 
where the pay dirt is thin or claims in small demand, or where from 
any circumstances he shall deem it reasonable, allow any free miner 
to register two claims in his own name, and allow such period as he 
may think proper for non-working either one of such claims. But 
no person shall be entitled to hold at one time more than two claims 
of the legal size. A discoverer's claim shall for this purpose be 
reckoned as one ordinary claim. 

5. All claims shall be subject to the public rights of way and water 
in such manner, direction, and extent as the gold commissioner shall 
from time to time direct ; no mine shall be worked within ten feet 
of any road, unless by the previous sanction of the gold commissioner. 

6. In order to ascertain the quantity of water in any ditch or 
sluice, the following rules shall be observed, viz., 

The water taken into a ditch, shall be measured at the ditch head. 
No water shall be taken into a ditch except in a trough whose top 
and floor shall be horizontal planes, and sides parallel vertical planes ; 
such trough to be continued for six .times its breadth in a horizontal 
direction from the point at which the water enters the trough. The 
top of the trough to be not more than seven inches, and the bottom 
of the trough not more than seventeen inches below the surface of 
the water in the reservoir, all measurements being taken inside the 
trough and in the low water or dry season. The area of a vertical 
transverse section of the trough, shall be considered as the measure 
of the quantity of water taken by the ditch. 

N 



170 APPENDIX. 

The same mode of measurement shall be applied to ascertain the 
quantity of water running in a trough or out of any ditch. 

Issued under the Public Seal of the Colony of British Columbia 
at Victoria, Vancouver Island, this sixth day of January, in 
the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty, 
and in the twenty-third year of Her Majesty's reign, by 
me, 

(L. S.) 

James Douglas. 

By His Excellency's Command, 

William A. Gr. Young, 
Acting Colonial Secretary. 



CHINESE. 

(From The Times of June 26th, 1860.) 

From the mines the news was never better. New diggings are 
constantly being discovered, and large earnings being made all over 
the mining region. The Chinese immigration, which was expected, 
is beginning to set in. About 800 Chinamen have arrived within 
the last fortnight, some of them in two vessels from China direct, 
others from San Francisco. They have nearly all gone up to the 
mines. 

Accounts from China say that a large immigration may be expected 
if the Chinese are well treated. 

There are no distinctions made against them in these colonies. 
They have the same protection as all other persons, and in the 
mines they are allowed the same rights, liberties, and privileges as 
all other miners, and the great bulk of the population is very glad 
to see them coming into the country. Fears for the result are the 
phantoms of a few nervous and ill-informed persons. 

From The New Westminster Times of April 11th, 1860. 

According to the San Francisco National " arrangements are 
making at that port for the conveyance of seven thousand Chinese 
passengers to British Columbia ; " and the same authority states that 
" it is highly probable that the total departures during the spring 
may greatly exceed that number." Thus we will have during the 



APPENDIX. 171 

summer a Chinese population of at least 10,000, or more than 
double that of our other inhabitants. 

"So considerable an accession to the population of the English 
possessions, will be very favourably received at this time by our 
northern neighbours. The movement of the Chinese in that 
direction, affords strong confirmation of the mineral wealth of 
British Columbia. This sagacious people do not migrate in large 
squads without sufficient preparation and satisfactory assurance that 
they will improve their condition by the change. Their agents 
have carefully investigated the Fraser river country, and reported 
favourably. It is found to offer better opportunities for the Chinese 
than the California gold fields under the present mining regulations. 
The sudden exodus of ten thousand or more of Chinese will have 
the effect of quieting for a time the irritation against that race 
which now prevails pretty generally throughout our diggings," 



THE END. 



LONDON 

rniNXED BY SPOTTISWOODE AND CO. 

NEW-STREET SQUAKE 



